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The Pros and Cons of Fan-Funded Recordings p. 17

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · VOL. 23 · NO. 35 · FREE

Killick

His Near-Death Experience and the Music It Inspired p. 18

Right-Wing Paranoia p. 8 · Merge Records p. 11 · Pretty Lights p. 19 · Next to Last Festival p. 24

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pub notes Care Costs Well, I’m a failure as a reporter. I went out to the (anti-) health care rally in Oconee County Saturday morning, finding the small crowd looking to be evenly divided between those who are opposed to efforts to fix health care and those who say it needs fixing. Things got started with a long prayer by the preacher who is the former chaplain to the Oconee County Republicans, in which he told God how much he loves His amber waves of grain and purple mountain majesty, even though some folks don’t. Then we of course had the pledge of allegiance, and then we sang the national anthem, a song that never fails to stir my heart and make me see through Francis Scott Key’s eyes that “our flag was still there.” I got a little antsy during the karaoke, with a former city councilman singing along to “God Bless the U.S.A.,” and then the preacher came back to give us his own views of our president and his proposals. The preacher pointed out that he is not racist in opposing Obama, because the president is “as much white as he is black.”

THIS WEEK’S ISSUE: News & Features City Dope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Athens News and Views

We may not know who stole the Daily Co-op’s carrot sign, but we sure know school’s back in session…

Comment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Health Care Reform and the American Apocalypse

Extremist right-wing paranoia is seeing a resurgence, and this is all about far more than health care.

Arts & Events The Reader . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Damn Townies…

For an Athenian, The Ingenious Edgar Jones reads like a 19th-century story of town-gown conflict.

Book Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

COVER DESIGN by Kelly Ruberto featuring artwork by Mathew Sugarman on display at the Lamar Dodd School of Art

True Indie

“The indie label that got big and stayed small” tells its story, 20 years in.

Music

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Pros and Cons of the Kickstarter Model . . . . 17 Who Needs a Label When Fans Fund Your Recording?

Paying for an album after it comes out is so passé.

Killick Is Just Happy to Be Alive . . . . . . . . 18 The Inspiration Behind Exsanguinette

A near-death experience inspires Killick’s most upbeat work to date.

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When I realized that Congressman Broun was a no-show and that Rep. Bob Smith was the only politician slated to speak, I began to lose enthusiasm. As Saxby Chambliss’ representative, a retired career Army officer on his staff, lectured us about why the government should stay out of health care, I asked myself, do I really want to know what Bob Smith is going to tell us about the “Democrat” health plan? Feeling that the Oconee Democrats were holding …the trend for doctors their own, I slipped out.

When I got back to treat medicine as a home, former Oconee Countian Ed Wilde was revenue stream rather channeling Dr. Atul than as a healing art… Gawande again, once more drawing my attention to a health care article in the New Yorker I had missed.

Regular readers of this column will recall that I recently mentioned Dr. Gawande’s Jan. 26 New Yorker piece explaining how universal health care developed organically in Britain and France and cautioning that any American healthcare overhaul has to begin with what we already have, like Medicare and the Veterans Administration coverage.

This time, in the June 1 New Yorker, Dr. Gawande tries to figure out what causes health care costs to be so much more in some places than in others and not related to better quality care. The conclusion this doctor draws, after considerable examination of the most expensive place in America for health care, McAllen, TX, is that the trend for doctors to treat medicine as a revenue stream, rather than as a healing art, is causing burgeoning costs and lessening quality. Dr. Gawande compares the cash-cow approach with places like the Mayo Clinic that have come up with a model which fosters collaborative teamwork with the emphasis on the patient rather than the patient’s insurer’s pocketbook. He says that more places are adopting the maximum medical revenue approach than the Mayo model, and that unless this is changed, it doesn’t matter who writes the check, costs will continue to rise and quality will continue to fall.

Wonder which model prevails in the Athens medical community?

Pete McCommons editor@flagpole.com

LETTERS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 CITY DOPE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 CITY PAGES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 CAPITOL IMPACT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 COMMENT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 THE READER. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 GRUB NOTES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 BOOK REVIEW . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 MOVIE DOPE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 MOVIE PICK. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 THREATS & PROMISES. . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

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RECORD REVIEWS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 KICKSTARTER. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 KILLICK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 PRETTY LIGHTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 THE CALENDAR!. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 BULLETIN BOARD. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 ART AROUND TOWN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 COMICS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 REALITY CHECK. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 CLASSIFIEDS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 EVERYDAY PEOPLE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

CONTACT US:

EDITOR & PUBLISHER Pete McCommons ADVERTISING DIRECTOR & PUBLISHER Alicia Nickles PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Larry Tenner MANAGING EDITOR Christina Cotter ADVERTISING SALES Anita Aubrey, Melinda Edwards, Jessica Pritchard MUSIC EDITOR Michelle Gilzenrat CITY EDITOR Ben Emanuel CLASSIFIEDS, DISTRIBUTION & OFFICE MANAGER Paul Karjian AD DESIGNERS Ian Rickert, Kelly Ruberto CARTOONISTS James Allen, Cameron Bogue, Matthew Doxtad, Joe Havasy, Missy Kulik, Jeremy Long, Clint McElroy, Josh Nickerson ADOPT ME Special Agent Cindy Jerrell CONTRIBUTORS Hillary Brown, Adam Clair, Tom Crawford, Tony Floyd, Christy Fricks, Jennifer Gibson, Jeff Gore, Gordon Lamb, Charley Lee, Bao Le-Huu, Cathy Mong, John G. Nettles, James Ridgeway, John Seay, Kristen Strezo, Drew Wheeler CIRCULATION Charles Greenleaf, Harper Bridgers, Jimmy Courson, Swen Froemke, Anthony Gentilles WEB DESIGNER Ian Rickert ADVERTISING ASSISTANT Maggie Summers EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Erin Cork EDITORIAL INTERN Fabian Poth MUSIC INTERN Charlie Stafford ADVERTISING INTERNS Melanie Foster, Teresa Tamburello

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letters

CONTACT US AT P.O. BOX 1027, ATHENS, GA 30603, LETTERS@FLAGPOLE.COM OR VIA THE “TALK BACK TO US” LINK AT FLAGPOLE.COM

RADIO REASONABLE? I was most disappointed when, a few years ago, WGAU (AM 1340) changed its evening talk show programming: it eliminated Bruce Williams and Jim Bohannon, who were interesting, witty, informative and respectful to their callers. Now each weeknight it gives us three hours of Laura Ingraham, and during the day, eight of Neal Boortz, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. Thus “Athens’ news and weather station” gives Athens a total of 11 hours of conservative talk radio with its hate-filled invective and distortions.

Why does WGAU, if it indeed wants to be “the station Athens depends on,” ply its Athens listeners, many of them liberal, with so many hours of rabidly conservative programs once its morning local news is over? To reflect the community it wishes to serve, this local “news” station should at the very least include national political talk shows that are more balanced, civilized—and, I must say, truthful.

Patricia McAlexander Athens

ORT QUERY There he goes—once again, Ort has piqued my curiosity. In his “Athens Street Names and Other Explorations” column [Aug. 26], Ort writes: “Now, have y’all ever heard of Lakeview Street?” Well, of course I have! But that’s not why I’m writing. Ort also writes, “There is no lake in evidence on Lakeview Street”—true

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FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

enough, my man—“but there used to be one To begin with I am certainly not saying there…” that the current state of health care is 100 I’ve seen that lake marked on an old map percent super, but it is good. It also is 100 of the neighborhood, but thought I heard percent better than what socialized national once that it had never actually been built— care will be. The government is not capable the implication being that some early 20thof running national businesses. It spends too century (or thereabouts) developer had just much and is too inefficient and too cold and named the street for the lake that he or some- unreasonable to be able to handle health care. one planned on building. But how do I know This 50 million uninsured number that you they never actually built it? I guess I assumed quote is also not quite true. Some of those so, partly since it’s not there today. included in this count are illegals and should Well, Ort, what get health care in can you tell me? Was their own countries. the lake real? Are Some are only tempoBUMPERSTICKER OF THE WEEK: there any definitive rarily without insurmaps or, better yet, ance and will upon old photos? Maybe getting a new job or someone in town still getting married to a Send your sticker sightings to ben@ remembers seeing it spouse with insurflagpole.com or call 706-549-9523. Thanks. there—or never seeance be once more ing it there? You’ve covered. Some simply whetted my appetite choose not to waste for ale before, dear columnist, now satiate a money on insurance because they are young reader with history! and healthy and would rather spend money on Isaac Boone other things. So please don’t pretend that this Athens number is really true because it isn’t.

In your article you mock socialism or people thinking that is what is happening. I tell you I grew up in a socialist country, and they did have socialized medicine. One day my I have just read your sarcastic little article grandfather had a stroke and we called for the [“Yo Mama Obama,” Pub Notes, Aug. 19] and ambulance to come and take him to a hospital one mile away. They did not arrive for five I feel obligated to comment. I would appreciate your answer back and I’d love for you to hours. When they finally arrived they asked for his government ID. We could not find it. He actually publish my comment since it is clear that only certain views are currently being was by this time barely able to move the right supported by the Flagpole. side of his body. The ambulance crew looked

I Farm. You Eat.

HEALTH CARE!

him over and then left him there because we could not provide ID. When we finally located his ID and called them back they only took three hours to show up. They took him to the hospital, where they said it was too late to do much for him. They checked him into a common room with three other patients and left him. The nurses never turned him or bathed him and he was paralyzed. He developed huge sores all over his body from not being cared for. The family had to go and feed him and bathe him. In conclusion he died like a dog there.

My other grandfather got cancer and when he went to the hospital they told him he was too old to receive treatment and they sent him home to die. And so he did.

Thus, personal experience tells me that this national health care program will lead to more abuses, and people going without treatment, than being uninsured in this present system does.

And if you think that it will be different because this is America, or for whatever other reason this will be different and better, I assure you it will not. This government could not handle Social Security, Medicaid, Freddie or Fannie or the postal office. It will botch this up too, and by then we will be sooooo deep in it we will be unable to overturn it… look at our tax code as a last example of government meddling.

P.S. One day you may be thankful that people like me didn’t and won’t ever give up our guns!

Catalina Horescu Email

city dope Athens News and Views

Deanna Pieniaszek

This Just In: Only moments before press time comes the news that U.S. Rep. Paul Broun, Jr. will hold a town hall meeting on health care in our neck of the woods. The “Athens” event is scheduled for 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 8 at the Oconee County Civic Center (2661 Hog Mountain Road in Watkinsville).

Broun has also scheduled two meetings for the evening of Wednesday, Sept. 2—one in Greensboro at 5 p.m. and one in Madison at 7:30. This is welcome news, as there’s already been a lot of discussion going on locally about health care reform while Broun has been hosting town halls in other far-flung corners of the district. Here’s hoping that constituents of his with a full range of views turn out to the Watkinsville event, and here’s hoping also that he’s ready to listen.

For more information, call Broun’s district office at 706-549-9588.

as an “Outstanding Corporate Leader.” With a fresh football season coming on, this is but another reminder that it’s too bad the UGA Athletic Association has had to be shamed into providing recycling opportunities by the student volunteers who started the Gameday Recycling program on fall Saturdays, but hey: whatever works. In the long view, it’s good to see Athens still leading the pack after being at the vanguard of municipal recycling programs in Georgia years ago. Now, if we could just avoid expanding the landfill…

Don’t Be Alarmed: And don’t freak out on the ACC Public Utilities Department crews who’ve now begun their rounds throughout town to open up fire hydrants and flush out the

Grand Theft Root Vegetable: The Daily Groceries Co-op on Prince Avenue reports that in late August, someone stole the iconic carrot sign that has hung for years above the store’s front door, pointing the way inside. Is it shallow of City Dope to suspect a link between the crime and the start of a new school year Have you seen the carrot? at UGA? Has anybody checked the frat houses for a trace of the water lines to remove mineral build-up. It’s missing veggie? It’s a fair enough assumption something that has to be done periodically to in this town… and actually might indicate clear out non-harmful iron and manganese and some relief for public resources at a time of stuff that accretes inside the pipes. Those who tight budgets, since road signs are so comwere in town a couple of years ago when the monly stolen by the 18-to-20-something male drought hit hard will recall that this flushing set. Meanwhile, the good news at the co-op program was put on hold in order to conserve is that local artist Lou Kregel (who made the water back in ’07 or so. They may also recall carrot) and Athens mosaic master Krysia Haag the saga of the brown water afflicting houseare already working on new signs for the shop, holds for a little while later that year, mainly though they probably won’t be ready for sevon weekends. The reason was that high water eral months. demand on certain days (with extra peaks because of watering restrictions at the time) Now That’s Providing Downtown Parking: City was dislodging the mineral deposits. Those Dope is belated in issuing a word of thanks were fun times, remember? to Mayor Davison and ACC officials on behalf Anyway, the flushing program is expected of all the townie hipsters who frequent the to take until May of next year to complete, west end of downtown on their bicycles. The and a full schedule (through the end of this city transportation department installed about year, for now) is posted on the Public Utilities 40 new bike racks downtown in late July, Department’s section of the ACC website. The concentrating them in places where bike parkcrews will generally be doing the flushing from ing was already heavy. Transportation director 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, David Clark estimates that about 70 percent of except for when they’ll hit downtown from the new racks are on the west end, but there’s midnight to 8 a.m. for a couple of weeks in also a new one in front of Espresso Royale mid-September, if things go according to the Caffe on Broad—evidence of the city’s respon- schedule. Officials kindly recommend that you siveness to pockets of high demand. The racks check your water to make sure it’s running were funded through SPLOST 2005 and seem clear prior to starting a load of laundry. to have been on the Mayor’s mind for a while now, as she’s mentioned the need for them in For Your Labor Day: It’s hard to believe meetings here and there. that this is the fifth year in which Athens’ Economic Justice Coalition will put on its Reduce, Reuse…: Also belated is a word of annual Labor Day Celebration of Workers’ congratulations for both Power Partners Rights. The events on Monday, Sept. 7 begin and Chase Street Elementary School, which at 6 p.m. with a light dinner and “celebratory each won a statewide award for their vigormarch” around City Hall, with the rest of the ous recycling and waste reduction programs night including a movie at Ciné, music at the at the Georgia Recycling Coalition’s annual 40 Watt and more. For more information, see conference on Aug. 25. Chase Street school the Flagpole Calendar or call the EJC at 706was one of three schools in the state to win 549-1142. an “Outstanding School Recycling Award,” and the local company Power Partners won Ben Emanuel ben@flagpole.com

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SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

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city pages Scooter-Sharing Coming Soon to the UGA Campus?

FIVE POI N TS

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FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

A shared transportation collective is arriving in Athens—on scooters. Scoot UGA, a new student organization, is partnering with ReCycle Scooters to bring fast, economical and environmentally friendly transportation to campus.

For an average of $60 a semester, members of Scoot UGA will have access to 40 scooters situated throughout campus. Initially, Scoot UGA will be a campus-based program—two hours would be the expected maximum use time and most people would only access the shared scooters for 10–15 minutes to get across campus. To start the program, group founder Peter Ahumada needs at least 100 students to sign up and, he says, if more join, “the price actually goes down.”

“I think we’ll get to 100 pretty quickly,” Ahumada says. Leon Ward, the owner of ReCycle Scooters, is enthusiastic about the project. “When the team at Scoot UGA came to us with the plan, I was 100 percent on board,” he says. “Very often we get students who are coming to UGA for one semester who are looking to be able to use a scooter for the three months they are here. Buying a new bike [i.e., scooter] is usually out of the question, and a good used bike is hard to find…”

The program works as a cooperative.

“Basically, everyone is going to buy two-fifths of the scooter,” says Ahumada, a PhD student at UGA. “We are not a corporation leasing scooters. We, the students, will own shares of them.” Each participating student will initially invest $480 to join the program, and will get some money back when they leave the program and sell back their shares.

“If you leave Athens in four years, your scooter will still be running, it will still be owned by you and you can sell it back to Scoot UGA for its residual value. I expect that a student who is at UGA four years will be able to get half his money back,” says Ahumada.

The idea for the scooter collective is based on other shared transportation programs such as Yellow Bike projects and the metropolitan Zipcar program (www.zipcar.com). “I’ve seen other similar programs and I know by my own experiences riding a bike in Athens, that you really need scooters—not bicycles and not cars,” says Ahumada. He believes that the hilly terrain makes bicycling more difficult in Athens compared to other places.

While there are a few kinks to work out such as parking and gas, the program is well on its way to being put into practice. “The cost of gas shouldn’t be a problem, but how to keep the tanks filled up will be,” says Ahumada. Participation is the key to the program’s success.

“Because of the quantity of scooters being purchased we are able to give the bikes to Scoot UGA at a discounted price…” says Ward.

“The more scooters we have around Athens the more people will come to view them as a viable alternative to automobiles. It’s also a great way for people to experience scooter riding who normally wouldn’t make the full investment,” he says.

“I’m doing this because I want to change the way transportation is done in Athens and at UGA,” says Ahumada. I think parking lots

are a waste of everyone’s grass. Wouldn’t it be nice if UGA were covered in trees and grass instead of parking spaces?“ Christy Fricks

Delays & More Delays in Utility Work at Dudley Park Sparkly granite boulders the size of Smart cars are piled in the parking lot of Dudley Park off East Broad Street. The rock was blasted out of the ground in preparation for laying new sanitary sewer pipe that will replace deteriorated 50-year-old terra cotta and castiron pipes. Other portions of the 18-foot-thick bedrock—lying only two feet beneath the surface in some spots—had to be drilled, filled with dynamite and blasted without damaging surrounding property. It was slow going, to say the least. This was but one of the obstacles facing Athens-Clarke County Public Utilities Department workers and their contractors working on this phase of the Upper North Oconee Interceptor Project, says Glenn Coleman, the department’s assistant director.

Motorists might refer to the project as a pain in the neck, since this is the second closing of East Broad Street around the park entrance. The road reopened for a brief time after completion of sewer line replacement at the Trail Creek bridge before being closed again. Coleman expects the street and Dudley Park parking lot to have a base coat of asphalt poured and the street reopened by Sept. 7.

Eventually, more than 12,000 linear feet of new, larger pipe will replace and extend the old. The total project, which began at the Bailey Street wastewater treatment plant and runs north along the eastern side of the North Oconee River, will cost $8.7 million. The project should accommodate growth in the area for the next 25 years, Coleman says.

Completion of another leg of the project was delayed by a couple of months after a short portion of tunneling in the park was not carried out at the proper slope and had to be abandoned and refilled, he says. Because this is a gravity sewer, a constant downhill gradient has to be maintained along the length of the sewer. (The tunnel was to run along the river but was rerouted to a different part of the park in order to minimize environmental impact, he says.) ”We do not have any cost in it whatsoever,“ Coleman says of the miscalculation on the gradient for the pipe. The mistake, however, added an extra two months to a project that was to be completed by late June. The abandoned portion was filled in and the tunneling completed Aug. 25.

The third part of this phase is to cross Oconee/Oak Street with new sewer line, but that, too, has been fraught with complications. Tunneling was begun there but workers found ”running sand,“ caused by contact with ground water from Trail Creek. Instead, the project will utilize what is called ”jack and bore,“ in which a piece of equipment on lines similar to a railroad track pulls the pipe as it travels under the road. Says Coleman, ”If the jack and bore is successful, traffic on Oak [Street] shouldn’t even know we’re there.“ Cathy Mong

capitol impact School Leadership Needs Improvement As the election for governor drew closer in 2002, the Republican challenger Sonny Perdue was beating up on Democratic incumbent Roy Barnes with anything he could find. One of the blunt instruments with which Perdue clobbered Barnes was the state’s last-place ranking on SAT college board scores: “Georgia’s better than that, that’s unacceptable, those are not the kind of results that we want, Roy Barnes, and Georgia’s going to do better because they’re going to elect new leadership that will work with educators to make sure that we do better.” He later added: “I’ve told you before, the SAT is the gold standard.”

Perdue and state school Supt. Kathy Cox are now in their seventh year in office as the persons responsible for the state’s direction in education. How is Georgia faring, as measured by Perdue’s “gold standard” of SAT scores?

Our schools are not doing very well. In 2003, during the first year of the Perdue-Cox reign, Georgia again ranked 50th in average SAT score. In 2004, the state skyrocketed all the way to 49th (thank goodness for South Carolina).

But by 2005, Georgia had slipped back into a tie with South Carolina for last place.

That ranking has since improved slightly, with Georgia currently in 47th place. The state’s average SAT score still ranks below the national average, however, and that score has been declining in recent years. The average SAT score for Georgia students (out of a maximum of 2400) was 1477 in 2006, 1472 in 2007, 1466 in 2008 and 1460 in the latest numbers released last week. That doesn’t look much like progress to me—it looks instead like Perdue’s vaunted “gold standard” is getting a little more tarnished every year.

During the same period, Perdue and the General Assembly were cutting a total of nearly $2 billion in state formula funding to local school systems. Do you think there’s a connection there?

Perdue cannot run for another term as governor, so there will be a new chief executive in 2011. Whether that governor does any better than Perdue at addressing the education issue, of course, remains to be seen. Cox, on the other hand, can legally run for a third term as school superintendent and, as far as I can tell, plans to do just that.

Does she deserve another term as the head of public education? It’s hard to argue in her favor, in part because she never raised any public objections or protests to Perdue’s continued cutbacks in spending on schools.

She could not have stopped those spending cutbacks, but she at least could have sent the signal that she would stand up for Georgia’s public school students.

It was also Cox who caused embarrassment for the state by attempting to remove from the science curriculum all references to evolution, the “Big Bang” and other scientific theories that upset the Christian fundamentalist wing of her Republican Party.

One of Cox’s top aides at the Department of Education, while being questioned in a school funding lawsuit, testified that high school students didn’t really need to take any science or social studies courses to get an “adequate” education.

“I think you can do without science,” the Cox aide said.

Cox and her husband have also filed for personal bankruptcy and were faced with having their home foreclosed. Should a person with that kind of financial record be running a state agency with a $5.5 billion budget?

Under the standards of the No Child Left Behind law, schools that don’t make adequate yearly progress in upgrading student performance are placed on the “Needs Improvement” list. Perdue and Cox would appear to be two names that belong on that list.

DEBIT

Tom Crawford

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

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comment Health Care Reform and the American Apocalypse Across the nation this summer, unknown numbers of people are hunkering down and arming up for what they believe is an imminent battle for the soul of America. Town halls and tea parties provide just a small glimpse of the rage, fear and paranoia fomenting on front porches and in Internet chat rooms, in the conservative heartland and beyond.

While the details may vary, the visions in such forums share a common theme: In one way or another, a fight to the death is coming, and coming soon.

These deep-seated fears explain at least some of the vitriol, the violent scuffles and death threats bubbling up in town hall protests against health care reform. It’s all too easy for certain right-wing activists to accept that the president’s plan will create death panels or mandate taxpayer-funded abortions, because some of these people don’t just believe that Obama wants to destroy capitalism and kill their granny and their unborn child—they believe he wants to kill them, too.

At a town hall meeting with Democratic Senator Ben Cardin in Hagerstown, MD on Aug. 12, one attendee carried a sign that read “Death to Obama,” and “Death to Michelle and her two stupid kids.” Another sign at the same event compared Obama to Hitler.

That’s not the only insidious comparison making the rounds: One protester who attended a raucous town hall with Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter told a Village Voice reporter that Obama was a “21stcentury Marxist” who would adopt the same methods Hugo Chavez used to take power in Venezuela: “infiltration of the education system, political correctness, class warfare ideology, voter fraud, brainwashing through the mainstream media.”

As the town halls have become more heated, the hints of violence have become increasingly overt. One man showed up outside the president’s town hall meeting in Portsmouth, NH with a hand gun strapped to his thigh; on Aug. 17, another brought an assault rifle to a demonstration at the site of Obama’s speech to veterans in Phoenix. It emerged that the latter’s presence at the meeting had been coordinated with a former member of the Viper Militia, whose adherents were convicted of weapons and conspiracy charges in the 1990s and were accused of plotting to blow up federal buildings.

Clearly, this is about far more than health care policy. Instead, it’s just one sign out of many heralding a resurgence of the extreme right wing. It’s been widely reported that extremist groups are growing, in numbers and membership, since Obama launched his presidential campaign. As in the past, some of the ideas espoused by these groups are working their way further toward the political core with the help of right-wing politicians and media figures.

For instance, take Rep. Michele Bachmann’s (R-Minn.) claim that expanding AmeriCorps would result in liberal “re-education camps.”

This statement has now morphed into rumors that the young community service volunteers are being armed to take over the country— possibly with some help from the New Black

8

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

Panther Party. Similarly, Dick Armey, the former House majority leader and lobbyist for the pharmaceutical industry, is predicting an October surprise from Obama in the form of “a hyped-up outbreak of the swine flu, which they’ll say is as bad as the bubonic plague to scare the bed-wetters to vote for health care reform.”

Among liberals, the dominant take on all of this seems to be ridicule and derision, or else impotent hand-wringing about the demise of “civil discourse.” It’s as if they’d forgotten that many of these so-called loonies just happen to own guns—and while liberals go on chattering, these folks are stocking up on ammunition. And right-wing radicals have an advantage when it comes to ideological fervor.

Obama and the Democrats in Congress quickly frittered away any populist energy that might have come out of the recession, the fiasco of the Bush years or the 2008 election. All that’s

halls, represent a long-standing force in the country’s political culture: American nativism. This oft-ignored strain draws its central impulse from an opposition to anything that challenges the vision of America as a white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant nation. Nativists have taken aim at Catholics, Jews, freed slaves and successive waves of immigrants, beginning with the Irish fleeing the potato famine in the 1840s and continuing through to present-day immigrants from Latin America. They call for a closing of U.S. borders and support strict adherence to the Constitution in its most literal sense, shorn of equivocating amendments, as a remedy for unwanted social change. And they have been inextricably linked to racist right-wing movements, from the Ku Klux Klan to the Militias to the Minutemen who now “guard” the border.

That’s why the election of Barack Obama adds even more fuel to nativist rage: The pres-

Clearly, this is about far more than health care policy.

Instead, it’s just one sign out of many heralding a resurgence of the extreme right wing.

left are compromises on top of compromises that they call policymaking—for which no one can muster much enthusiasm. Right-wing zealots, on the other hand, think they are fighting for their lives by standing fast against communism, or the anti-Christ, or both; they’re not only doing God’s work, but also fulfilling their destiny as true American patriots.

Indeed, the right-wing revival is infused with the words and imagery of the American Revolution. The gun-toting protestor at Obama’s New Hampshire health care town hall was also carrying a sign that read, “It Is Time To Water The Tree Of Liberty”—a clear reference to a quote from Thomas Jefferson that the “tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” (Because he had a permit and wasn’t in shooting range of the tyrant, the patriot was allowed to keep his gun.)

On a website also called The Tree of Liberty, members exchange Obama insults and apocalyptic visions in a forum called Committees of Correspondence, named for assemblies in colonial America that protested tyrannical British policies.

The denizens of these gatherings and websites, the tea parties and the raucous town

ident is a black man, child of an interracial union, the son of a foreigner who bears a foreign name. According to some, he is not even an American citizen. “[T]he face of the federal government—the enemy that almost all parts of the extreme right see as the primary threat to freedom—is now black,” says a report from the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups.“ And the fact that the president is an African American has injected a strong racial element into even those parts of the radical right, like the militias, that in the past were not primarily motivated by race hate.”

For me, the recent outpourings on the right-wing fringe resonate strongly with what I witnessed in the mid-1980s, when I was working on a book and film on the racialist far right called Blood in the Face. I came across people caught in the misery of economic depression, caused by tough loan practices and declining prices for farm commodities, along with a drive by big banks and insurance companies—the primary farm lenders—to consolidate smaller farms into bigger and bigger agribusiness units in the interest of larger profits. Many residents were losing farms that had been in their families for generations.

In this atmosphere of desperation, paranoia flourished. Some talked about a hunting party in Mexico that had spotted a secret airfield of MIGs. Some had heard reports from Baja California of a troop of North Korean troops hidden in the forest. Others said they knew the Russians were breeding an especially strong horse to haul heavy artillery across the Bering Strait for the coming attack. Still others told me that the United States and the Soviets were making deals aboard small submarines under the Arctic ice. And the new superhighways leading from Texas up the Mississippi River, they said, were part of a secret plan to accommodate Mexicans carrying backpacks stuffed with small nuclear bombs. Many also saw social factors like abortion, feminism, homosexuality and interracial marriage as symptoms of the general devolution of American culture. Behind it all, they believed, were the Jewish bankers, the Trilateral Commission, the Federal Reserve, the UN—and the U.S. government.

The people who believed these things bought food and ammunition and hid it in safe places. They got out of the banks, went from paper money to gold, bought mini 14s. Some built bomb shelters or small forts for defense.

They studied the Bible at night and believed they had discovered in Scripture secret plans to eradicate their way of life.

They got ready to fight. A few actually died in bloody shootouts with the Feds: Elusive Posse Comitatus leader Gordon Kaul and the Order’s Bob Mathews were the movement’s first martyrs in the 1980s, followed by those who died in the 1990s at Ruby Ridge and WACO—both cited by Timothy McVeigh as inspiration for the Oklahoma City bombing.

The vision of dead babies being carried out of the Murrah building in 1995 prompted a crackdown on far-right movements by federal law enforcement. But even before Obama’s election, pockets of activity remained.

The Southern Poverty Law Center has reported rapid growth among right-wing fringe organizations, although it says the numbers don’t yet equal the heyday of the militias in the 1990s.

Still, the greatest danger is likely to come not from card-carrying members of any organization, but from small, leaderless cells or lone gunmen, perhaps inspired by another far-right favorite: the biblical story of the Phineas Priest, a man who caught an interracial couple together and slew them both, declaring that he was acting in the name of a just God. It is the same notion of justifiable homicide—whether in self-defense or in defense of a just cause—that reportedly drove Scott Roeder, the gunman accused of killing abortion doctor George Tiller, and James von Brunn, accused of murdering a guard at the Holocaust Museum.

The people I met back in the 1980s told me about their theories and their plans for the coming conflict earnestly, fervently. I first saw this fervor resurface last year, while covering the election in the so-called heartland. I saw it on the fringes of Sarah Palin rallies, and I saw it when a Missouri ethanol plant manager leaned forward confidentially and declared, for the video cameras, why he was against Obama—because the candidate, he said, bore the mark of the Beast, of Satan, or the antiChrist: 666.

James Ridgeway Veteran reporter James Ridgeway is a senior correspondent for Mother Jones magazine.

the reader Damn Townies…

Recently my wife and I went out for date night and attended a free performance by the UGA Symphony Orchestra, then went for some tasty burgers at Clocked, saw a great band at Flicker, and ended up having a nightcap at the Go Bar. It was, all in all, a deeply satisfying evening, one of many that we’ve spent moving between the worlds of the University and downtown. In the last year we’ve gone to see Noh performers, watched our fine local burlesque troupe, pub-crawled with zombies, attended lectures and openings and juried exhibitions, seen some great community theater, eaten very well and discovered musicians and musicians and musicians…

I say it often in this column (and yet not often enough), and the beginning of the UGA school year is a perfect time to reiterate: Athens is a wonderful place to live whether you’re here for school or here for life. Unlike a lot of other college towns, which seem to be mere parking lots for their institutions of higher learning, over the years our town has struck a vital balance between the offerings of the university and the vibrant life of town itself. On any given day or night there’s a dozen or so things to do, all of which beat mall-trolling or bingedrinking at the house.

All you need do is seek them out (the hippie socialist rag you’re holding now is a good place to look).

While there are many townies who won’t venture through the Arch and many students who refuse to travel west of Hull Street, the opportunities are always there.

This was not the case not too terribly long ago. There was a time when a university was a gated enclave, an exclusive preserve of the sons of the upper classes as they prepared to take their places as lords and masters over the rabble circulating about the other side of the walls. Town existed to provide for “gown,” but the two worlds were off-limits to one another. Such is the portrait Elizabeth Garner presents of Oxford University, the setting of her remarkable novel The Ingenious Edgar Jones (Random House, 2009).

William Jones considers himself blessed in his rise from orphaned kitchen-brat to his current job as an Oxford porter (a glorified night watchman), in his marriage to former tavern-wench Eleanor, and in the impending birth of their child. The child is born one night in 1847, his arrival coinciding with a meteor shower, as if the skies themselves are announcing his presence. But the boy is strange from the moment he draws breath, a leathery baby with a ridge of stiff hair down his spine. Young Edgar is wild and inquisitive, looking to escape even before he can walk, and getting into everything. His feral disposition is matched by his unwillingness to speak and, after he finally does, in his inability to learn to read. Eleanor despairs of her child and soon so does the more amiable William. It seems that nothing can be done for the boy, even after William gains an audience with a

professor of physiology, who proclaims the boy’s affliction to be “bad blood.”

But Edgar is much more clever than anyone around him realizes. His explorations and insatiable curiosity have given him an acute insight into how things work and are put together, and at seven he apprentices himself to the local blacksmith, where he learns how the pieces of iron that hold the world together are forged. When a controversial professor of anatomy asks the smith for help in building a contraption for his experiments, it’s Edgar who figures out how to do it, and soon the boy is working for the professor on the most ambitious project the university has seen in an age, the building of a natural history museum, a monument to the emergence of the sciences from beneath the cloud of religion.

The museum will be the battleground between Oxford’s old guard and a new breed of scholars determined to break God’s mysteries wide open, but for Edgar all that matters is the building, the blossoming of the architecture, and the song of the iron. His father, however, is not so sanguine—not only does this new edifice fly in the face of everything he has always believed about man’s relationship with God’s creation, but when Edgar is callously dismissed by his patron, William finds a growing rage within himself against the university and its so-called better class of men. Edgar has his own grudges going, and when he is apprenticed to Oxford Town’s resident inventor, he acquires the skills to enact a terrible vengeance on the men who tossed him aside.

All of these forces come together on one ill-fated night with cataclysmic results and disastrous consequences.

Garner has put together a great novel here, Dickensian in atmosphere and sentiment, but with an ability to make the period seem immediate that one finds in the work of Susanna Clarke and Neil Gaiman. While it’s by no means a steampunk novel, fans of that genre will find the iron and smoke, clockwork and gadgetry of the age quite comfortable. Garner imbues her characters with life and subtlety, and not the least of these characters is Oxford itself. The book is a love song to the university, with its spires and gargoyles and old stone steeped in history, which she renders in deep, affectionate detail.

The ending of the book may surprise some readers—one critic called it “a late lunge into magical realism”—but I find the ending completely in keeping with the rest of the novel, with its constant supply of wonders in a time when wonders were about to become commonplace, when reason was on the brink of becoming the dominant force in academia and the world beyond, and when the divide between the cloisters of learning and the rest of unwashed humanity first began to crumble.

It was an exciting time, and The Ingenious Edgar Jones is a story worthy of it.

Music Exchange

FANTASTIC NEW ACOUSTIC GUITARS!

John G. Nettles

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

9

grub notes Italian Encore

114 COLLEGE AVENUE

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What Goes Around: Way, way back in 2003, Stefano Volpi and Salvatore Bianco opened Bischero in the Bottleworks on Prince, building in a beautiful brick pizza oven and focusing on fine Italian dining. After a few rough summers, they moved on, and the space became a revolving door of ownership and restaurants, all vaguely Italian but none with the same commitment to quality of the initial incarnation. Volpi helped start Mirko Pasta, which is not a bad thing in its own right at a lower price-point, but Bianco is back in the original space, with a restaurant now called A Tavola! (237 Prince Ave.) that is, despite some simplification of the menu, basically what we once knew as Bischero. It’s a longish story and journey, but, at least for now, and at least for my taste buds, it’s a happy ending. Finally, someone who knows how to use that oven again, rather than toasting pizzas in it briefly before setting them under the heat lamp on the ledge of the kitchen to wilt.

Being from Atlanta rather than up north, where real Italian restaurants can be found on every corner, I probably can’t really consider myself an expert, but I recruited a friend from Pennsylvania who refuses to eat out for Italian, and all the offerings passed muster with her. If I had to nitpick, I’d point out the near-impossibility of baking a crust evenly from edge to middle while maintaining delicacy—if you don’t want a cracker or the kind of mouthful of dough you’ll get from most pizza, you’re going to get a wee bit of sogginess in the center, even with ingredients sparsely applied the way they should be.

It still feels a little gauche to fold over your slice in a relatively nice restaurant, but the waitress will encourage you to go for it. Dividing your pie (a bargain and a huge amount of food per person at around $12–$15 each) into triangles is harder still, but no doubt pizza wheels for the tables would disap- …gorgeously salty and pear into many a handbag smoothly textured. if provided. (It may be easier to have the waiter cut it with a pizza wheel for you.) I’m a big fan of Your Pie, but I don’t think it has anything that can match A Tavola!’s topping of turnip greens and thinly sliced sausage, which demands thoughtful chewing. The one that features pineapple, Gorgonzola and balsamic, however, may be a bit much.

A pleasant sense of surprise is present throughout, from the pile of mushrooms served warm in the center of a charcuterie plate to the real olive oil that comes with the bread and wakes up your nostrils. Please note that that bread is perhaps the best thing you will eat all night. Push the focaccia to the side and dig into the slices of the other stuff, which is gorgeously salty and smoothly textured. Really, even carbophobes would pretty much dig through the dumpster for a leftover bag of it. The saltimbocca alla romana (veal scaloppine in a creamy sauce) was unexpectedly delicious as well, despite not looking like much, with well-seasoned spinach and potatoes on the side. The pastas, all made in-house (or most made in-house, depending on who answers your questions), are nicely done, too, not gluey or heavy the way they can often turn out.

I would certainly thank my stars if I never had to sit through another round of Andrea Bocelli’s “Con te Partiro,” and the decor could use a shot of life, but the restaurant has trained its staff well. Even when there were far too many of them, as in its early weeks, when the dining room was still finding its audience, they never slouched and gossiped with one another, channeling their energy instead into folding napkins or refilling the water glasses at every opportunity. There is, in fact, a certain polish aspired to throughout, most clearly exemplified in the fact that, while A Tavola! will do take-out orders, it will not pop your pizza into the oven before you arrive, lest it be handed to you at a temperature other than the precise one it desires. The restaurant only does dinner at present (every night but Sunday), has beer and wine, and still possesses a very nice patio out front.

What Up?: The not very secret news that Hugh Acheson, Charles Ramsey and Peter Dale of Five and Ten and The National are opening up a restaurant in Atlanta is becoming less secret by the day. Expect a clever take on meat-and-three at Peachtree and 10th streets, across the street from the Margaret Mitchell House, and, no, this doesn’t mean they’re abandoning us for greener pastures.

Hillary Brown

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FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

book review True Indie With record sales declining precipitously and major labels dishing out pink slips like candy, some are eager to declare the music industry, as we know it, dead. But for Mac McCaughan and Laura Ballance, members of indie-rock band Superchunk and owners of the Durham, NC-based record label Merge, business ain’t bad. As McCaughan says in the new book Our Noise: The Story of Merge Records (Workman Publishing, 2009), “People may be buying fewer bad records, but I don’t see them buying fewer good records.”

Since its inception in 1989, Merge has released good records in spades. In fact, the label has garnered so much good will in the music industry that it has chosen to celebrate its 20-year history with this thoughtfully put together volume. The book, written by music journalist John Cook with McCaughan and Ballance, documents the label from its humble beginnings up through its current successes, profiling, in succession, many of the bands that helped establish Merge as a premier independent label.

With over 300 color and black-and-white photographs of everything from performances by the label’s bands to reproductions of handwritten lyrics and other Merge bric-a-brac, Our Noise is destined to grace the coffee table of your friendly neighborhood music fan. But as a document, the book is more than just a collection of pretty pictures. The story of Merge Records is the story of Superchunk, which is itself the story of McCaughan and Ballance’s relationship. The two dated in the early days of Superchunk, and then separated while remaining bandmates and label owners. A fair portion of the book discusses the fallout of the breakup and how the duo powered through their personal issues to continue creating and releasing music.

The majority of the chapters in Our Noise, though, are devoted to bands in the Merge family. Some of the groups featured include Neutral Milk Hotel, Spoon, The Magnetic Fields and Arcade Fire. These chapters function as mini-biographies of some of the best bands of the last two decades. Fans of Spoon, for

example, might be eager to read about the various different styles of music the band experimented in before settling on its current sound. Because the book does focus on Merge, the biographies primarily discuss the bands’ relationships with the label. But this focus can yield interesting nuggets, such as the fact that despite its almost universal popularity, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea has only sold 254,000 copies. Or that Arcade Fire, though courted by numerous major labels, never believed any of them could offer the band anything that Merge couldn’t.

Unlike some other books on bands or labels, Our Noise is written interview-style.

The various chapters read like long interviews with all of the members of the band, fans of the band, people who worked with the band, all with some occasional commentary by Cook linking the quotations. The presentation can be confusing, as sometimes the reader may find himself having to turn back multiple pages to determine a speaker’s relationship to the band. But the style does contribute to the informal feel of the book, and the more personal interview style is especially fitting for Merge, a label that has a reputation for forging personal relationships with its artists. Our Noise reads like the people themselves are sitting in a room discussing the music.

As an insight into the inner workings of a record label, Our Noise is also illuminative. In the early days, Merge did not use written contracts with its bands, preferring instead to operate on a handshake (however, after getting burned one too many times, the label now uses quasi-standard independent label contracts). Part of the label’s growing pains consisted of learning hard business lessons. Though McCaughan and Ballance created a record label solely to release music they loved, eventually they also needed it to afford them a decent living and pay the wages of their growing staff. However, the appropriate balance between passion for music and business acumen was not always easy to strike. As McCaughan says in the book, sometimes capitalism creates “tensions between artists, consumers and businesses that are not always easily squared.”

Our Noise demonstrates that Merge is successful because—to many music fans—the label’s imprint signifies quality. That element of consumer trust is often what’s missing in the major label world. Yes, the music industry as defined by the actions of major labels is probably dying. But as Cook writes, “Merge was an outlier and holdout in a corporatedominated business; as the behemoths fail, it could become a forerunner in the devolution of the music business back to the sort of small, competitive independent labels that made rock ’n’ roll possible.” Congratulations to Merge on a well-conceived and executed book, and here’s to 20 more years of success.

(706) 850

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LAST WEEKS! DON’T MISS!

John Seay

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

11

movie dope Some releases may not be showing locally this week.

(500) DAYS OF SUMMER (PG-13) Tom Hansen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a boy. Summer Finn (Zooey Deschanel) is a girl. The film’s narrator lets you know from the get-go their story does not come from the happy ending department. Boy meets girl; girl breaks boy’s heart into tiny pieces. (500) Days of Summer brilliantly shows us their entire relationship, from cute beginning (an office romance ignited by karaoke and alcohol) to whiskey-drowned end.

ADORATION (R) For an assignment, high school student Simon (Devon Bostick) weaves the story of his parents (Noam Jenkins and Rachel Blanchard), both killed in a car accident, with a news story about a terrorist. Controversy arrives when his fact-meets-fiction tale goes viral.

ALIENS IN THE ATTIC (PG) A family moves to Maine and discovers the top floor of their new home has been invaded by aliens. The cast is all over the place. First, there’s High School Musical alum Ashley Tisdale; then you’ve got “SNL” vets Kevin Nealon and Tim Meadows. Director John Schultz (The Honeymooners) won some awards for his 1996 debut, Bandwagon. I honestly can’t decide whether I’m looking forward to this or dreading it more than I did G-Force.

ALL ABOUT STEVE (PG-13) Poor Bradley Cooper. The Hangover didn’t come out soon enough for him to avoid being in a romcom starring Sandy Bullock. Eccentric crossword creator Mary Horowitz (Bullock) falls in love with cameraman Steve (Cooper) after just one date. First-time feature director Phil Traill’s 2003 short, Dangle, was well-received, but I’m not curious to see how he fares with cookie-cutter comedy. With Thomas Haden Church and Keith David (not to be confused with David Keith).

AWAY WE GO (R) Burt and Verona (John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph)

are searching for a place to raise their yet-to-be-born child after Burt’s selfish parents (Catherine O’Hara and Athensborn Jeff Daniels) announce their plan to move to Belgium. Away We Go, written by novelists Dave Eggers (A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius) and his wife, Vendela Vida (cofounder and co-editor of The Believer), reads like a quirky, literarily humorous National Book Award finalist. k CARRIERS (PG-13) Four friends (Star Trek’s Chris Pine, Piper Perabo, Emily Van Camp and Thumbsucker’s Lou Taylor Pucci) try to outrun a deadly virus decimating the United States.

With the big, empty hotel, Carriers resembles a Dawn of the 28 Shinings Later, but the flick, the feature debut of Spanish writing-directing brothers, Alex and David Pastor, has a cool sheen to it. I don’t imagine anyone will remember Carriers once the adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s post-apocalyptic masterwork, The Road, comes out.

CLOVERFIELD (PG-13) More experience than movie, Cloverfield immerses you in a fake attack on New York City.

It’s a lean (the movie is only 84 minutes long), mean monster movie that completely fills in the template blanks, yet what makes Cloverfield so striking is its structure. Shot on handheld digital cameras, the entire film sustains the illusion that everything is happening right then and there to the small band of interchangeable 20-somethings.

The thing I want to talk about most is the monster, floating theories about its appearance and origins (smartly left unknown per the film’s internal logic), but I won’t. That would spoil a lot of the fun of a monster movie that feels amazingly real.

DEPARTURES (PG-13) (NR) This year’s Oscar-winner for Best Foreign Language Film bested The Class and Waltz with Bashir. Now it’s time to put up or shut up. A recently unemployed

cellist, Daigo Kobayashi (multiple award-winner Masahiro Motoki) returns to his hometown and begins a new career as an “encoffineer,” the person who prepares the deceased for burial and the next life. Director Yôjirô Takita’s film snagged 28 other international awards to go along with its Oscar.

DISTRICT 9 (R) I will not fill your minds with ringing, hyperbolic endorsements such as, “District 9 Is

Dude! I told you to fix the AC. the Best Movie This Year!” Instead, I’ll go with, “District 9 Is the Freshest Sci-Fi Since Pitch Black.” For the past 20 years, insectile aliens, derisively nicknamed “Prawns,” have resided in slums constructed just outside of Johannesburg. This new underclass of illegal aliens anger the populace, and the South African government hires private military corporation, MNU (MultiNational United), to relocate the Prawns from the outskirts of Johannesburg to a specially constructed concentration camp. Problems arise when paperpusher Wikus Van Der Merwe (Sharlto Copley) is appointed to head the relocation operation by his corporate father-in-law. While attempting to get alien signatures on the proper

M OVIE L ISTI NG S

Theater schedules often change after our deadline. Please call ahead.

ACC LIBRARY (706-613-3650) D Tour (NR) 7:00 (Th. 9/3)

BEECHWOOD (706-546-1011)

Due to production deadlines, Beechwood movie times are only accurate through Sept. 3. Visit www.flagpole.com for updated times.

(500) Days of Summer (PG-13) 5:05, 7:20, 9:30 District 9 (R) 4:10, 7:10, 9:50 The Final Destination (R) 5:10, 7:30, 9:50 G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (PG-13) 4:20, 7:00, 9:40 Halloween II (R) 5:15, 7:35, 10:00 The Hurt Locker (R) 7:05, 9:50 Inglourious Basterds (R) 4:30, 8:00 Julie & Julia (PG-13) 4:05, 7:00, 9:40 Post Grad (PG-13) 5:05, 7:20, 9:30 Shorts (PG) 4:15 Taking Woodstock (R) 4:05, 7:00, 9:40 The Time Traveler’s Wife (PG-13) 4:25, 7:25, 10:05

CARMIKE 12 (706-354-0016)

Due to production deadlines, Carmike 12 movie times are only accurate through Sept. 3. Visit www.flagpole.com for updated times.

District 9 (R) 1:45, 4:20, 7:10, 9:45 The Final Destination (3D) (R) 1:45, 4:15, 7:05, 9:35 G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (PG-13) 1:30, 4:15, 7:05, 9:45 G-Force (3D) (PG)12:20, 2:35, 4:50 Halloween II (R) 1:30, 4:05, 7:10, 9:40 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (PG) 12:30, 4:00, 7:30 Inglourious Basterds (R) 12:45, 1:45, 3:55, 5:00, 7:05, 8:15, 10:15

12

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

forms, Wikus contracts an alien virus that mutates his DNA. Single dad Christopher needs Wikus’ help to get his kid, the cutest alien since E.T. phoned home, off the planet.

D TOUR (NR) 2008. Just when Pat Spurgeon’s rock and roll dreams come true, his kidney fails. Daily dialysis and finding an organ donor put a whole new twist to life on the road.

Director Jim Granato won the Golden Gate Award for Bay Area Documentary

Julie & Julia (PG-13) 1:00, 4:00, 7:00, 10:00 Post Grad (PG-13) 7:30, 9:40 Shorts (PG) 1:15, 3:25, 5:35, 7:45, 9:55 Taking Woodstock (R) 1:15, 4:00, 7:00, 9:55 The Time Traveler’s Wife (PG-13) 12:15, 2:45, 5:15, 7:40, 10:10

CINÉ (706-353-3343)

Adoration (R) 7:15, 9:30 (new times F. 9/4: 9:30) (add’l times Sa. 9/5–Su. 9/6: 2:15) (no 9:30 show Su. 9/6) Away We Go (R) 5:00, 9:45 (new times F. 9/4: 9:45) (add’l times Sa. 9/5–Su. 9/6: 3:00) (no 9:45 show Su. 9/6) Departures (PG-13) 4:30, 7:00 (starts F. 9/4) Food, Inc. (NR) 5:15, 7:30 (new times F. 9/4: 5:15, 9:45) Made in L.A. (NR) 6:00 (M. 9/7)

GEORGIA SQUARE 5 (706-548-3426)

Due to production deadlines, Georgia Square Five movie times are only accurate through Sept. 3. Visit www.flagpole. com for updated times.

Aliens in the Attic (PG) 5:20, 7:35, 9:55 My Sister’s Keeper (PG-13) 4:05, 7:20, 10:05 Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian (PG) 5:25, 7:50, 10:15 Public Enemies (R) 4:00, 10:00 Star Trek (PG-13) 7:15 Up (PG) 5:25, 7:50, 10:15

TATE CENTER THEATER (706-542-6396)

Cloverfield (PG-13) 8:00 (Th. 9/3) Star Trek (PG-13) 3:00, 6:00, 9:00 (F. 9/4–Su. 9/6)

Feature at the San Francisco International Film Festival. Featuring performances by Rogue Wave, The Moore Brothers, John Vanderslice, Nada Surf and Ben Gibbard. Part of the ACC Library’s iFilms series.

EXTRACT (R) Office Space writerdirector Mike Judge may have disappointed with his 2006 follow-up, Idiocracy, but Extract looks like a return to the workplace antics at which he excels. Nice guy Joel (Jason Bateman) owns an extract plant and has to deal with a cadre of professional idiots and personal problems. The cast, including Kristen Wiig, Mila Kunis, Ben Affleck, J.K. Simmons, Clifton Collins, Jr., David Koechner and more, is shaping up as fall’s strongest comedic ensemble.

THE FINAL DESTINATION (R) The most successful post-’80s slasher franchise returns with a 3D installment.

Again, some numb nut disappoints unseen, ever-present Death by way of a prophetic vision, this one about a deadly accident at a stock car race.

I really hope Halloween II slaughters FD4 at the box office. Still, the silly, scary Final Destination flicks know exactly what they are and should please the segment of the horror audience rubbed raw by Zombie’s meaner film.

FOOD, INC. (PG) Fast Food Nation’s Eric Schlosser and Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, peek inside the pantry of America’s corporate kitchen, analyzing the effects of a corporate-controlled food industry on the country’s farmers and the health of its citizens.

GAMER (R) Neveldine/Taylor, the love ‘em or hate ‘em auteurs behind Crank and Crank: High Voltage, take online gaming to the next level in this Running Man/Death Race wannabe.

Gerard Butler stars as Kable, a death row inmate and popular “Slayer” looking to overthrow the game’s mastermind, the inexplicably old Southern Ken Castle (Michael C. Hall, “Dexter”). I’m looking forward to this overly kinetic film despite my better judgement. With Kyra Sedgwick, John Leguizamo and Amber Valletta.

G.I. JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA (PG-13) In the not too distant future, G.I. Joe is no longer merely a real American hero; he’s now a real global hero led by General Hawk (an appropriately stiff-jawed Dennis Quaid) and backed by the most talented soldiers from the world’s top militaries. The lineup includes popular characters like Snake Eyes, Scarlett, the lesser-known Heavy Duty and Breaker, recruited to battle a new threat: the world’s largest arms dealer. Where Transformers is clearly a blockbuster of the 2000s, G.I. Joe remains boxed in its original packaging from the late 1980s, to which my inner eight-year-old bellows a hearty, “Yo, Joe!” G-FORCE (PG) G-Force is being touted as über-producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s first 3-D and family film.

The heroes may be furry, well-animated guinea pigs voiced by Sam Rockwell, Penelope Cruz, Tracy Morgan and Nicolas Cage, but the loud, busy action movie definitely hails from Bruckheimer’s gated Hollywood neighborhood. It’s as good—or as bad—as any old Bruckheimer production.

HALLOWEEN II (R) Writer-directorrocker Rob Zombie’s reinvention of bogeyman Michael Myers continues in what trailers promise to be the last installment. (Riiiiiiiight.) Authorities never discovered the body of the hulking masked killer (ginormous Tyler Mane), and Haddonfield, Illinois has lived scared ever since. Meanwhile, Michael’s sis, Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton) isn’t quite adapting to her role as sibling to the spawn of Satan. Malcolm McDowell returns as Dr. Sam Loomis. This flick looks genuinely scary.

HARRY POTTER AND THE HALFBLOOD PRINCE (PG) In his sixth year at Hogwarts, young wizard Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) and his pals, Ron and Hermione (Rupert Grint and Emma Watson), must contend with Death Eaters, a puffed-up new Potions prof and love potions. In his second Potter film, director David Yates gets what makes the books so special and translates that quality to the big screen unlike any of his predecessors; fivetime screenwriter Steve Kloves has perfected extracting only the essentials from Rowling’s doorstops. Half-Blood Prince is the prettiest Potter film as well.

THE HURT LOCKER (R) See Movie Pick.

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS (R) Once upon a time, the world was at the mercy of a madman. Then “The Basterds,” a gang of Jewish-American soldiers led by a Southern mountain man, swept across Nazi-occupied France. The world lived happily ever after. The hyperbolical trailers are right.

You’ve never seen war until you’ve seen it through the eyes of Quentin Tarantino. Inglourious Basterds is the film both critics and moviegoers have been waiting for since the ‘90s trifecta of Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown. Anyone only exposed to the previews will be shocked to hear that Basterds is QT’s most mature film, despite its graphic, gratuitous violence and howling hilarity.

JULIE & JULIA (PG-13) I’m afraid I don’t “get” Meryl Streep. I certainly understand how talented she is, and I feel it’s just and deserved if the Academy chooses to reward her for a

record 16th nomination. It’s less her acting prowess that boggles me than her mystique, the power she holds over women over 45. As I watched Streep gloriously honk her way through Nora Ephron’s delicious new film as the famous TV chef Julia Child, I was pleasantly entertained; much of the decidedly older crowd was in hysterics. Julie & Julia is the twin culinary tales of Julia Child and Julie Powell (the delightful, cute Amy Adams), a lowly government employee who finds meaning—and a book deal—in cooking all 524 of the recipes in Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking in 365 days and blogging about it. You might think the Sleepless in Seattle auteur is breaking up with her longtime partner, the romcom, but J&J is still about couples—three to be exact: Julia and Paul Child (Stanley Tucci); Julie and Eric Powell (Chris Messina); and Julia and Julie—in love. Julie & Julia isn’t a fancy French delicacy; it’s Hollywood comfort food prepared with love and laughter.

MADE IN L.A. (NR) Documentary film about the development of a workers’ center in Los Angeles.

Discussion about the workers’ center in Athens follows the screening. Part of the Economic Justice Coalition’s Celebration of Workers’ Rights.

MY ONE AND ONLY (PG-13) I am at a loss for words after learning that My One and Only is based on the life of the tan one, George Hamilton. I wasn’t expecting that. Renée Zellweger stars as Anne Deveraux, a glamorous ‘50s vixen who cruises the eastern seaboard seeking a new husband and daddy for her two boys, George (Logan Lerman, set to hit it big in 2010’s first Percy Jackson & the Olympians flick) and Robbie (Mark Rendall). With supporting actors Chris Noth, Kevin Bacon, David Koechner, Eric McCormack and Steven Weber.

MY SISTER’S KEEPER (PG-13) Writer-director Nick Cassavetes, son of acclaimed independent filmmaker John Cassavetes, should stick to weepies.

As interesting as his teen crime noir Alpha Dog was (and it wasn’t nearly as intriguing as Brick), it was The Notebook that revealed his adroit ability for audience manipulation via source treacle. A teenage girl, Kate (Sofia Vassilieva), is dying. Her 11-year-old sister, Anna (Abigail Breslin), was genetically engineered to save her older sister. Now Anna doesn’t want to be poked, prodded and cut any more so she hires lawyer Campbell Alexander (Alec Baldwin) to sue her parents, Kate and Brian (Cameron Diaz and the undervalued Jason Patric), for medical emancipation. An overstuffed pepper of melodrama (a dyslexic brother, a grieving judge, etc.), My Sister’s Keeper never lets one tragic ingredient overwhelm the tear-inducing whole.

Rather than one big contrived knockout punch (complete with swelling music), Cassavetes sticks and moves, unleashing an episodic flurry of sorrowful jabs like a teen cancer romance (Say Anything with chemo). The wonderfully acted, written and directed My Sister’s Keeper proves that a little (or a lot of) emotional manipulation is not always a bad thing. Criers, beware, this tearjerker requires a whole boxful.

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM: BATTLE OF THE SMITHSONIAN (PG) Everything about NatM:BotS improves on the lifeless original, especially the thankful lack of monkey antics of which there are a mere toned down few.

POST GRAD (PG-13) Alexis Bledel, billed as “the star of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” but known and loved as Rory Gilmore, takes the solo reins in Post Grad. Recent college graduate Ryden Malby (Bledel) can’t find a job, so she moves back in with her parents (Michael Keaton and Jane Lynch). Ryden also has to choose

the right guy between the reliable friend (Zach Gilford of “Friday Night Lights”) and the bespectacled neighbor (Rodrigo Santoro). With Carol Burnett as the grandmother.

PUBLIC ENEMIES (R) Filmmaker Michael Mann’s latest crime drama, Public Enemies, is the biggest cinematic disappointment of 2009 to date.

Starring Johnny Depp as infamous bank robber John Dillinger and Christian Bale as pioneering G-Man Melvin Purvis, this film musters less intrigue about a fascinating period of American history than a History Channel documentary. The film isn’t a massive epic about the ‘30s crime spree that led to the creation of the FBI. It could be. All of the pieces have been placed on the board, but the gangland games never begin.

STAR TREK (PG-13) Director J.J. Abrams brings Gene Roddenberry’s idyllic, stodgy creation to warp speed.

Abrams and writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman revive the franchise with a breezy, action-packed matinee abandon never before seen in this often sober universe. Abrams, Orci and Kurtzman make the Enterprise’s tricky, high-profile refitting—not to mention the successful construction of a summer blockbuster—look easy.

SHORTS (PG) Robert Rodriguez’s new feature, Shorts, continues the filmmaker’s kiddie movie mania. It’s easily his worst yet, even by childish standards. A town is thrown upside-down with the discovery of a rainbow-hued wishing rock. Kids make dumb wishes.

Adults make worse ones that can only be corrected by their kids. Respectable adult stars—William H. Macy, James Spader, Leslie Mann, Jon Cryer and Kat Dennings—cash paychecks for disreputable work. The child performers, including Star Trek’s Jimmy Bennett and Rodriguez’s own brood, give worse performances.

TAKING WOODSTOCK (R) This slight Ang Lee historical comedy, his first American language film since Brokeback Mountain, grew on me as I watched it. It’s nowhere near as funny as it thinks it is, and the ‘60s clichés (the awesome Emile Hirsch gets saddled with the post-traumatic stressed Vietnam vet) abound. Still, the story of how Woodstock came to be thanks to the help of interior designer Elliot Teichberg (writer-comedian Demetri Martin, who grows as an actor right there on the screen). Living with his parents for the summer at their Catskills motel, Elliot brings together concert promoter Mitchell Lang (a very cool Jonathan Groff) and dairy farmer Max Yasgur (the always loveable Eugene Levy) to save what becomes the most important music festival of all time. Lee might disappoint some viewers by withholding Woodstock’s key ingredient, the music, but most people know it by heart. What they don’t know (if they, like me, haven’t seen Michael Wadleigh’s Oscar-winning 1970 documentary) is how the music festival came to be.

THE TIME TRAVELER’S WIFE (PG13) I won’t speak for fans of Aubrey Niffenegger’s beloved bestseller; I have no clue as to whether or not it’s a good (i.e., faithful) adaptation of the love story of Henry (Eric Bana), a regular guy with a genetic predisposition for time travel, and Claire (Rachel McAdams), the lovely lady who falls in love with grown-up naked him at the age of six. As critics and sci-fi nuts love to point out, Niffenegger’s time travel premise is flawed, paradoxical and perfect for her passionate story.

Bana and McAdams are pretty. Tears will be shed. The Time Traveler’s Wife should please romance junkies pining for their next chance to pine.

TYSON (R) Controversial filmmaker James Toback (Black and White)

returns to documentaries for the first time in a decade with this chronicle of his pal, former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson. Tyson’s legendary infamy ever increases; maybe Toback, who’s known him since the late ‘80s, can shed actual illuminating light on one of modern sports’ most mercurial figures. With Tyson’s recent cameo in June’s smash hit, The Hangover, what better time to reflect than the present? Winner of the Regard Knockout Award at Cannes.

UP (PG) Pixar doesn’t make kids movies anymore (if in fact they ever did); they make family films. While kidfriendly, the latest Disney-Pixar film, Up, deals with some serious issues upfront (infertility, old age, death) before unleashing a most fantastic, fantastical adventure film. Seventyeight-year-old Carl Fredricksen (v.

Edward Asner) and his late wife, Ellie, always dreamed of traveling to South America. After Ellie’s eventual death, Carl floats his house to the fabled Paradise Falls with the help of several thousand helium balloons. Carl and a young stowaway, lonely Wilderness Explorer Russell (v. Jordan Nagai), confront the wilderness for the first time, encountering a mythical bird, a talking dog named Dug (voiced by co-director and screenwriter Bob Peterson), and even Carl’s childhood hero, lost adventurer Charles Muntz (v. Christopher Plummer). With its odd old protagonist (Carl’s in better shape than Jack LaLanne), Up is bound to be the year’s most unconventional blockbuster. Every minute of the film, co-directed by Pete Docter (Monsters, Inc.) and Peterson, bursts with creativity and ingenuity. In Dug, the worn-out anthropomorphic animal sidekick is imaginatively reinvented to produce the film’s freshest, biggest laughs.

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movie pick The Right Combination THE HURT LOCKER (R) Right now and despite its title, The Hurt Locker stands alone atop Metacritic’s “Current High Scores” at 94. No other film is within five points. Using what I assume is a rather complex mathematical system, the best film out right now, hands down, is a military thriller set during the height of the Iraq War. While I have to imagine, once the best film of the year race gets crowded with award-caliber winter entries, The Hurt Locker will cede its illustrious position, I cannot think of a better film I’ve seen thus far this year. I feel strange bestowing that title on Star Trek or The Hangover or even Up, and the highly anticipated Funny People left me wishy-washy.

So, why not The Hurt Locker? It has an award-worthy lead performance. Its director is a critically beloved female action-movie creator. Nothing else has stood out from the crowd in 2009. All right, I’m convinced. The Hurt Locker is the best film of 2009, so far…

With less than 40 days left in their rotation, Bravo Company’s Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) unit is issued a new team leader, Sergeant First Class William James (Jeremy Renner). James joins Sergeant J.T.

built around the action figure version of the bright, quick and sharp witted James. Instead, Renner, first-time feature writer Mark Boal (a journalist imbedded with a bomb squad), and director Kathryn Bigelow dig deep into what makes James the only ticking time bomb he can’t disarm. Mackie (Notorious’ Tupac) is equally as good as Renner; Sanborn isn’t as good as James. Still, Mackie does a lot with the little he is given in the U.N. building evacuation and the tense sniper standoff.

Familiar faces, bigger names and higher ranks drop by occasionally. Guy Pearce, David Morse, and a particularly badass Ralph Fiennes all make the briefest of what can only be termed cameos, and I don’t blame them. I’d jump at the chance to appear in a Kathryn Bigelow film, a rare opportunity considering she’s only made eight feature films (including Near Dark, Point Break and Strange Days) since 1982.

Bigelow crafts the highest intensity, hottest war drama made about Iraq. She and Barry Ackroyd, the cinematographer from United 93 and Ken Loach’s Palme d’Or-winning The Wind That Shakes the Barley, capture the explosive microcosm of bomb removal, espe-

Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) and Specialist Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty). The arrival of Sgt. James upsets the close-knit team, which is still recovering from the loss of their previous leader.

Largely plotless, The Hurt Locker follows the EOD team through the rubble-strewn streets of Baghdad, where every rubbish pile may hide an improvised explosive device, better known as an IED. We travel from highly charged bomb defusing to highly charged bomb defusing, witnessing adrenaline-junkie James risk the lives of his comrades on a daily basis. And the days roll by until Bravo Company can go home.

Anyone waiting for an overarching mystery to solve or an explosive mastermind to catch will be disappointed. The Hurt Locker is about two soldiers trying to survive the war and the one fellow soldier who may be more dangerous to them than the enemy. With the weight of the film resting on their well-shaped shoulders, Renner, Mackie and Geraghty deliver.

Renner is the frontrunner for the Academy’s dark-horse-nominee for Best Actor. A familiar face either from television guest appearances or supporting roles, the sly actor had not revealed the depth of his chops. In the hands of a bigger-name, less talented actor, James could be a plastic G.I. Joe. Renner plays him on the edge of everything: sanity, the cliff, the river, et cetera. A franchise could be

cially when the team fails. The slow-motion, ground-up recreation of the opening explosion is sickening and gorgeous. The force of the desert ambush hits like each silent bullet from the seemingly empty horizon. Still, all of Bigelow’s films lose a bit of their steam before they climax. Add The Hurt Locker to the list of Bigelow films of which I’m quite fond but don’t love, yet I’m not quite sure why. Everything looks right but never feels it.

Maybe I don’t have the stamina to handle the constant stress of her vampire neo-Western (John Carpenter’s Vampires can suck it), her futuristic sci-fi noir or her surfing, bank-robbing masterpiece, unfairly derided for starring Keanu Reeves and post-Ghost Patrick Swayze.

The Hurt Locker has already started collecting awards from the Nantucket Film Festival, the Seattle International Film Festival and the Venice Film Festival. Could the Oscars—or at least the Golden Globes—be next? Bigelow’s film might be the first to benefit from the newly expanded Best Picture category. The Hurt Locker may not be the year’s best film, but I cannot imagine its not being in the top 10. If the film doesn’t last long enough at Beechwood, stick this review on the fridge so you remember to see it if you get a second chance courtesy of Ciné.

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threats & promises Music News And Gossip The unseasonably cool weather initially tempted me into thinking Athens was sliding into autumn bonfire time when, in actuality, we have several more weeks of sweaty rock and roll to attend to. Start your engines below…

Jason Thrasher

News About News: Local artist and musician Mux (Rat Babies, Mr. Blank) has announced plans to do another Carnivale of Black Hearts show this year. The show is a collection of sideshow and musical performances similar, but not the same, to other extreme traveling carnival shows. Mux has suffered some setbacks this past year, with a serious injury to a finger and various economic problems, but is determined to hold at least one Carnivale of Black Hearts event before the year is out. The venue is yet to be determined, but it looks like the date is going to be on or around Oct. 24. Check back periodically at www. mrblankisdead.com for more info.

Kicking Against the Pricks: One of the best local bands you never heard of, Mass Solo Revolt, has finished its new record and is raising funds via Kickstarter.com to facilitate manufacturing. Donations as low as one dollar are totally acceptable.

Indeed, everyone that donates to this project, no matter what amount they donate, will get their name listed on the Mass Solo Revolt back of a limitededition t-shirt by the band. There’s lots more goodies being offered by the band, too, in exchange for different tiers of donations. Just go check out www.kickstarter.com and search for Mass Solo Revolt. If you wanna hear what you’ll be supporting, check out the band’s newest tracks over at www.myspace.com/ masssolorevolt. You can also read more about Kickstarter on p. 17.

k

Clean Your Closet: I’m pretty sure anyone reading this column would agree that music in schools is a good thing. I know I do. Well, the marching band program at Burney-HarrisLyons Middle School is asking the community to please donate old marching band instruments so that kids who want to participate but don’t have the funds to purchase or rent an instrument can do so. Also, if you have something and are not sure if it’s a “marching band” instrument, please ask them. I mean, Mike Mills (R.E.M.) played the electric bass in his high school marching band and, you know, John Philip Sousa had never imagined anything like that. So, interested parties should contact Kevin Shorner-Johnson via email to shornerjohnsonk@clarke.k12.ga.us. And, yes, your contribution is tax deductible.

Unapproved Overtime: On Saturday, Sept. 5 you can head down to Little Kings Shuffle Club for a free Labor Day show featuring Dead Dog, Daffodil and Liverty. This is Dead Dog’s last show in town before the band takes its

killer music and awful name out on the road for six weeks. Also, what better way to celebrate the backbreaking history that led to several things we now take for granted than by swilling back several PBRs in quick succession and watching some punk bands? Exactly.

Check out the bands via www.myspace.com/ daffodilathens and www.myspace.com/dead dawgz.

Always Do Your Best: Local hip-hop producer and rapper Son 1 (Curtison Jones) has a new mixtape coming out in October, but he’s got an idea to include others. Titled “The Swaggerific 16 Contest,” Jones has posted three different beats for it online. What you do is download the beats, choose one, and then write your most “swaggeriffic” 16-bar verse to it. Then, videotape yourself performing the lines and upload it to The Swaggerific 16 page on Facebook. All voting is done via the comments section.

All kinds of prizes, including a threesong demo produced

by Tneb-RCP Music, will go to the winner.

The second and third place winners will be featured on the new mixtape. The contest ends Sept. 13, so head to www.son1music.com and get every shred of details you need.

Get ‘Em: Sure, Athens.

I know. You don’t like to buy advance tickets for anything.

Who knows what you’re gonna be doing that night, right? Well, be that as it may, but you still may want to snatch up some tickets for Saturday night of the three-day Kindercore/Owl Scooters Hootenanny (the only night for advance tickets). The fest runs Sept. 17–19, and Saturday features Maserati, Still Flyin’, The Young Sinclairs, Ruby Isle, Venice Is Sinking and Allison Weiss. Tickets are a mere $10 and are available over at www.kindercore.com.

Big Update: After a few months of fairly unorganized, but well-intentioned, charitable giving toward the restoration of the Georgia Theatre, the cause can now accept funds through the non-profit Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation. These donations are tax-deductible and may be sent to The Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation, Attn: Kate Ryan, 1516 Peachtree St. N.W., Atlanta, GA 30309. Please indicate “The Georgia Theatre Rehabilitation Fund” on the memo line of your check. In other news, Athens officials have approved the bracing and stabilization plans needed to begin rebuilding so the interior demolition can begin. Also, architects have begun making plans for a new theatre interior. Further, the theatre has aligned with the Music Business Program at UGA whereby the program will help raise funds, but then the rehabbed Georgia Theatre will pledge those funds back to the program.

Gordon Lamb threatsandpromises@flagpole.com

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record reviews FOREIGN BORN Person to Person Secretly Canadian Two things immediately come to mind when thinking about Person to Person: first, it’s largely good listening; second, Secretly Canadian has made another good investment. For those unaware of their own latent familiarity with the Bloomington, IN-based label, let me remind you that it releases work from Danielson, Antony & the Johnstons, Magnolia Electric Co., and Jens Lekman—to be frank, this release finds itself among respectable (and active) company before the first note sounds.

But when it does, it becomes almost immediately clear that this band has a special melodic sensibility unique unto itself, which is not only the sustained and crowning grace of this collection, but perhaps the group’s most attractive feature overall. Sure, like its labelmates before it, Foreign Born’s music features a distinctive vocal element (in this case much influenced by the hollow, raspy strength seen in the ‘90s Britpop scene from performers such as Richard Ashcroft), but with repeated listens the vocals on Person to Person seem to get further and further from recognition or allure and, at times, begin to feel somewhat mediocre in comparison to the faithfully intriguing and exploratory song structures with which they interact. To me, this album sounds like it could’ve been written by James Mercer after an Allman Brothers binge, but then sold to Supergrass to record. That’s to say, it’s complicatedly arranged, highly percussive, fuzzed-out in the bass department and loaded with jangly guitar lines.

And, importantly (perhaps quintessentially), it is meticulously played and cleanly mixed. But the vocals can only go so far.

Tony Floyd

THE NEW UP Better Off Independent Release It’s not often I get shocked and awed by a relative unknown, but The New Up has come along with its latest release, Better Off, and shattered my placid veneer with some of the most striking, exotic and brashly coherent indie-ish pop that’s ever graced my ears. With ghostly, snarling female vocals layered over confident, careening choruses that feel like the sonic

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equivalent of a thrill ride, it could almost be likened to Siouxsie Sioux fronting a fantasy ‘90s psychedelic altrock band, but that wouldn’t do the fivepiece justice. Even as a 100 percent DIY outfit, The New Up has found a way to put everything in its exact place without seeming like type-A control freaks and in the process created a shocking sound where influences are evident but never the main event. There is no one leading them there but they. Read: these are ultimately unique and beautifully crafted songs showcasing abilities light years ahead of many contemporaries.

The quality of musicianship, blissful and ominous riffs and harmonies, clear passion for the craft and just plain precision make this EP something to get excited about—and indeed, I am.

Jennifer Gibson

welcomes it, not from resignation but from ambition.

Adam Clair Adam Clair is currently working on a book about the history and influence of the Elephant Six Recording Company.

DEPEDRO Depedro Nat Geo

CIRCULATORY SYSTEM Signal Morning Cloud Recordings Eight years is an eternity in the music world. The last eight in particular have been especially so, given how quickly things appear and fade anymore. Since Circulatory System released its self-titled debut in 2001, countless records, bands and even genres have come and gone and left behind nothing. Everything is fleeting and Now, with no regard for what comes next.

But Signal Morning is not a Now record; it is an Always record, temporally unfettered and presented not without regard for the future but with uncertainty as to whether it will come at all. It drifts through space and attempts to understand every part of the universe, from infinitesimal molecules and microbes to Earth and inestimably beyond.

The organic imagery is indeed a dominant thematic element of Signal Morning, which sprawls across the natural world but, most of all, feels immanently human. On an album rife with talk of trees and skies and sand and stone, the most salient feature is the speaker himself: a sometimes plaintive, sometimes achingly muddled but always sincere Will Cullen Hart.

In a lot of ways, this is just Circulatory System picking up where it left off, maintaining the obtuse, symbolic lyrics in nebulous tandem with the signature fuzzy production of its debut. As before, Circulatory System’s cosmic sensibilities are further embellished by the band’s ability to meander seamlessly from buzzing chainsaws of distortion to tinkling acoustic repose as well as its proficiency in balancing whatever sort of dominating guitar with strings and reeds and ubiquitous bits of perplexing sonic ephemera buried so far beneath.

Despite the urgency of its textures and sound collages, Signal Morning does nothing to predict or even anticipate the future. Instead, it offers a persistence and a permanence that simply

For its first full-length release, fledgling label Nat Geo (yes, as in National Geographic) has decided to play its ace. Though only his debut solo album, singer-songwriter Jairo Zavala, the mastermind behind Depedro, is anything but a nobody. He happens to be the touring guitarist for southwestern indie heroes Calexico.

And to make the maiden effort by this Madrid native that much more notable, Calexico happens to be the backing band for most of this record. The primarily Spanish-language collection tills the common soils between his native Spain and southern North America through folk music traditions. Atop a lush bed of horns, strings, vibes and whispering rhythms, Zavala’s affecting rasp and intimate acoustic guitars conjure the rustic heartbeat with nobility.

Beginning with the sighing, horndraped gallop of “Como el Viento,” this record casts its spell right out of the gate. Other wonders include the journeying cowboy sway of “La Memoria” and the broad Mexican sweeps of “Te Sigo.”

DePedro is rendered in deep, romantic hues and washes over you in warm breath-like breezes of solitude and soul. It’s an unassumingly perfect record that works modesty into majesty and is a debut that’s as auspicious as it gets.

Bao Le-Huu

JEFF THE BROTHERHOOD Heavy Days Infinity Cat Referring to a band as “garage rock” these days is almost an insult. As with any quick and easy sub-genre tag, it’s more dismissive than descriptive.

So, yeah, Jeff the Brotherhood is a duo that plays minimal rock and roll via guitar and drums. You’d never place their music next to any band that would self-reference themselves as a garage

band. There’s almost none of that ‘50s and ‘60s four-chord, bop-bop, singa-long la-la here. Jeff the Brotherhood plays direct, propulsive, heavily rhythmic rock and roll that simply requires no more than two instruments.

These brothers, Jake and Jamin Orrall, have an understanding of melody that doesn’t rely very heavily on obvious influences. That is, although the songs they write find a place in the listener’s head quite quickly, there’s no knowing how a song is going to play out. The anticipation one feels when listening is authentic rather than predicative.

Brief, almost miniscule, flourishes of psychedelia occasionally pop up on Heavy Days. Mostly, though, the songs are constructed via a straightforward beat and guitar lines that often seem to not even require more than three strings. Solos, when they happen, are limited, not so much by tastefulness, but by efficiency. As with the band’s other releases, there is simply no fat to be found. Their tunefulness is found most distinctly on the title track, “Heavy Damage,” and on “Dreamscape.” The most traditionally pop-oriented track is the same one that is the single, “Bone Jam.” Here the band does employ a few vocal “whoo-whoo” harmonies, and they’re fine and all, and the track is a total winner, but it’d be a shame if this kind of fluffy song became the focal point. As listener bait, though, it’ll do.

But there’s a hell of a lot of real meat here to sink one’s teeth into.

Gordon Lamb

MONOTONIX Where Were You When It Happened?

Drag City This is what rock and roll was always meant to be. Despite the coded language it had to employ early on, its urge was always carnal. And the garage-jacked hard rock blasting from the Israeli trio’s debut full-length is no-shower, no-condom sex on a disc.

Here, all their animalism is finally unchained.

The stuttering thunder of “I Can’t Take It Anymore” and the hot-licked “My Needs” are undiluted shots of high-proof badassness. The moment of clarity is the smoldering “Set Me Free,” where an expectant meter ticks on the razor’s edge while Yonatan Gat’s wicked guitars shred and Ami Shalev’s gloriously vulgar voice slashes. But the raw wantonness of “As Noise” is everything Monotonix is in one song, swerving in and out of pissed shambles, towering ejaculations and primal screams.

Monotonix packs so much pure simian power that its legendarily wild performances can compress all cosmic meaning into the moment at hand. Capturing that sort of juice on record is like getting Bigfoot on film.

But somehow, they’ve managed to do it here, in focus and in hi-def no less.

It’s an impossibly vibrant capture of the most virile rock and roll band in the universe.

Bao Le-Huu

Pros & Cons of the Kickstarter Model Who Needs a Label When Fans Fund Your Recording?

F

or most musicians, the funds invested in creating a record usually come from a record label, money made from merch sales or out-of-pocket. Yet, as the Internet evolves, so do money-making ideas. With so much competition out there, musicians are at the behest of their own interests for new ways to raise funds.

Kickstarter is one way that DIY music is keeping itself afloat, even in hard economic times.

Kickstarter.com is a fundraiser website devoted to creative projects in need of financial support. First the artist must submit his/ her project for approval by Kickstarter. Once the project page goes live, the project creator sets a goal for the amount of money needed and the deadline by which those funds must be accumulated. It’s up to the artist to promote the fundraiser and direct people to the project page. Most artists offer incentives to entice funding, promising things like limited editions of songs, invitations to BBQs or a mention

in the liner notes, depending on the amount donated. Supporters pledge their donations on the website, but Kickstarter.com will only collect those funds if the goal amount is met before the predetermined deadline.

Allison Weiss’ Tips on How to Make the Most of Your Kickstarter Campaign When local musician Allison Weiss launched a Kickstarter campaign this summer, her goal was to raise $2,000 in three months. She ended up reaching her goal in less than eight hours! By the end of her campaign, she had surpassed her goal by a staggering $5,000. Obviously, this lady knows how to tap into her online supporters. What’s her secret? Here are her suggestions for a successful Kickstarter campaign:

1. Be Creative

The more creative the project, the better. Make sure your idea is new or innovative, or come up with a new way to raise the funds. Human beings want to be entertained, so do it!

2. Great Pitch Video

Make your pitch video as short, interesting and funny as possible. Put it up on YouTube in addition to your Kickstarter site. The more engaging the video, the more likely people are to spread it around.

3. Awesome Prizes

Come up with interesting prizes and rewards to offer. Get creative with it and really think about whether your prize is worth the donation. Make sure it’s something you can actually do. Also, offer group prizes—i.e., when you reach a certain point, reward everyone who has donated. This will encourage people to tell their friends to donate if they know they can get something out of your success.

4. Get a Custom URL

The Kickstarter website doesn’t really have the best options for URLs. If you have a website, get your webmaster to create a domain specifically for your fundraiser project. The easier the address is to remember, the more likely people will donate and tell their friends about it. You can also use a URL shortening service like TinyUrl or Bit.Ly.

5. Ask for help!

Promote the hell out of your project. Send out information to your mailing list. Text message your friends. Twitter, Facebook, blog about it. Tell the local papers about what you’re doing. Make flyers and hand them out. Make sure you spread the word because every little bit gets you closer to your goal!

A strange phenomenon to follow in its progression, online fundraising websites such as Kickstarter.com and the similarly structured Fundable.com present both new solutions and new quandaries in the already tumultuous music market. At their best, these sites provide a simple way for broke, right-brained thinkers to toss out the nets to those wishing to support creative projects. At its worst, it’s a faux not-for-profit without any accountability to its supporters. Whether Kickstarter is supporting artists, musicians and the like, or a form of cyber begging has been created, is entirely subjective.

While Kickstarter is not only for musicians, some of its most recent and notable successes have been Athens bands. In fact, many Athenians first heard of Kickstarter when local acts Allison Weiss, Chris McKay and the Critical Darlings and Venice Is Sinking signed on to fund the recording and/or production of their albums.

Superficially, Kickstarter and other websites like it appear to bring DIY to a new level. So far, the model seems to be successful because the concept is entirely accessible.

Most creative projects need funding. People want a chance at philanthropy which they can afford. Fans want to show their loyalty to their favorite bands. Plus, with the advent of MySpace, Facebook and Twitter, bands have already become acclimated to interacting directly with their fan base and keeping them informed as quickly as possible (lest their fans forget them). Bands are now expected to be self-promoters and frequently turn to their fans for support—whether it’s inviting people to a show, recruiting extras for a music video or even making decisions about their creative direction. So why not tap that market for financial backing as well?

When it works, it works well. Paste magazine, like most print magazines across the nation, recently ran into some harsh economic times. Its remedy was to ask for online contributions from Paste supporters. In return, Paste offered the donor, based on his/her contribution, unreleased songs and the chance to win autographed merch from various high-profile

bands. Paste’s fundraising turned out to be incredibly successful, collecting $250,000 from over 10,000 donors.

It sounds like a cut-anddried way to raise money for individual projects, but creative works are often unpredictable and bad things can and do happen. Hope for Agoldensummer’s Claire Campbell knows all too well the potential drawbacks of collecting donations to fund a record. Although her band didn’t use Kickstarter specifically, Hope for Agoldensummer did solicit “pre-orders” from fans so the band could afford to record Ariadne Thread.

After what seemed to be a successful fundraiser, the band began recording at the pricey studio of its dreams. However, in the midst of recording, two members chose to leave the band and insisted that their contributions be erased from the sessions. The remaining members had to start the recording process all over, and a year’s worth of work was lost. “It took another year plus going into credit card debt to get the album finished,“ says Campbell. “We were able to placate some folks by releasing an EP that was free to those who had pre-ordered. But, towards the end of two years, many of our fans were pissed, as it had been years since most of them first contributed.” Worse still was the fact that after all of that time, some of the fans’ addresses changed and the final product couldn’t be delivered. “Though we sent out emails beforehand asking for address changes,” Claire continues, “many people who had moved did not respond. So, for months afterward we would get returned-to-sender CD packages.” Claire’s hard-earned advice to bands: “Wait. If you can, hold off taking money until you are absolutely sure you can give a product.”

It is through supporters that projects come to fruition on Kickstarter and other fundraising sites, but how are these fans considered?

Kickstarter and Fundable projects do not have to disclose how each dollar helps fund projects. This leaves donators vulnerable to loss should the project they help fund fizzle out. CEO of Kickstarter, Perry Chen, believes that the site is self-regulated. He goes on to say that in relation to Kickstarter’s long-term goals, he believes that “this is where commerce is heading. Real connections between people.”

Perhaps the fate of online fundraising is all in the hands of laissez-faire capitalism.

This model is still in its infancy (Kickstarter was just launched in April of this year) and will surely evolve through a series of trials and errors. Whether or not the idea of online fundraising is appealing, it’s a force to be considered. What does resonate is the spirit of philanthropy that sites such as Kickstarter and Fundable seem to inspire. It can certainly be said that there are idealists out there trying to fund their dreams, somehow. That, in itself, is inspiration for the creative force.

Kristen Strezo

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

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Killick Is Just Happy to Be Alive

The Inspiration Behind Exsanguinette

The Inspiration Behind Exsanguinette

T

Rinne Allen

he music of Athens composer Killick has gone through many phases over the past dozen years or so. He has explored the full range between the traditionally beautiful and the exquisitely brutal. His newest release, however, marks the first time his music is clearly exuberant and joyful. A near-death experience can do that to you.

A little over a year ago, Killick suffered massive internal bleeding due to a duodenal ulcer and his condition was decidedly touch and go. During his recovery, he would begin to compose the music found on his newest album, Exsanguinette (released Sept. 1). “All the music and all the concepts for the music took place after ‘the bleed.’ At that point, I was really just glad to be alive. A big thing was that there was no sense of struggle,” he says. “It all flowed out very organically and almost effortlessly. It felt as if these were ideas whose time had come.”

Killick, who handles guitar, electronics and a few vocals, is joined on this release by Liz Albee on trumpet, conch shell and electronics, Brann Dailor (Mastodon) on drums, vocalist Delene Porter and Larry Ochs (ROVA Saxophone Quartet). The album feels both very highly composed and highly improvisational. In actuality, the former is the truer.

Although he didn’t really rely on written charts, Killick simultaneously recorded and conducted during the single session that birthed Exsanguinette. That session lasted a mere four hours, too. “We set up on a Tuesday night and started recording the next day about 12:30 p.m. and were done by 4:30 p.m.,“ says Killick. “It was highly structured. There was a lot of room for the music to take on its own character in the moment.

Everyone knew a lot of the parameters. Basically, I created

some boundaries, some of which were to be honored and some which could be overstepped.”

When approaching Killick’s music for the first time, though, boundaries aren’t the first thing that comes to mind. Indeed, neither is any sort of structure. But, the easy adjectives of “noise” and “experimental,” while not entirely inapplicable, seem to fall a little shorter when describing Exsanguinette compared to his earlier work. Certainly, Killick messes with forms, but the music here is far more celebratory than destructive. From the saxophone blasts of the lead track, “Uninhibitorrent,” through the heavily processed creek water samples and conch-shell solos of “Esteempunk” to the tenderness of “Mr. Woodson,” the album is all of a piece. The entire

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record is repeated through a series of remixes immediately following the last track. “I think people will find it surprising with regards to what was highlighted in each track,” says Killick. “I don’t know if there’s a typical remix approach, but they don’t sound like any I’ve heard.” His approach to the remixes was completely hands-off as he gave cart blanche to the producers—Jeff McLeod, 247, Kyle Dawkins and IdM Theft Able—who handled them.

The full production of the physical product was a several-months-long affair that was directly tied to both Killick’s recovery period and newfound patience with process. He says, “I was just concentrating on my physical recovery. I didn’t know exactly what I was gonna do with [the recordings]. I did the entire layout on the interior. [Tattoo artist] Watson Atkinson generously did the cover art. I’m really happy because nothing was really rushed.”

It’s not at all necessary to have a familiarity with Killick’s catalog to gain something from Exsanguinette, but it helps. For the curious, though, you’d do just as well beginning here and working your way backward. For his part, Killick seems content that the album is simply out. And for the first time in his recorded history, he has produced a document that doesn’t seem to point to something beyond itself or to a future goal or musical exploration. It’s simply a man’s expression of the exhilaration of being alive. “That fine line between life and death can’t really be described,” he says. “I have a very different perspective now on how to interpret things and how to read things. As far as the music, the record, everything… I have no complaints.”

Gordon Lamb

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FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

2.00

$

Pretty Lights

Immerse Yourself in the Music remember the group taking extended-arm photos of themselves onstage at the Georgia Theatre that aforementioned February evening will undoubtedly vouch for the sincerity of his sentiments. This is a person who clearly loves the fact that Athens can get together a massive crowd for a blisteringly funky dance party and devour every note for hours on end and still ask for more. And, Smith and Pretty Lights are predominantly about sharing the music. In fact, the entire Pretty Lights catalogue can be downloaded for free at www.prettylightsmusic.com.

With over 130,000 downloads of the most recent Pretty Lights double-album in the past nine months, and over a million MySpace plays, Smith still plans to release the upcoming Passing by Behind Your Eyes free of charge. He says, “I think one of the things that makes this project special is that there’s respect between the audience and the group, and after thinking a lot about it, I wanted to keep the music available for free because I like the idea of Pretty Lights being a part of this change in the industry.”

So, there you have it—you can have as many Pretty Lights MP3s as you want completely gratis, and when you’re hooked, the group will swing through town, throw a hell of a dance party and collect enough bread from you to keep the guys in the studio, mixing samples into “electro, organic, soulful, dubby, glitchy, bangin’ downtempohiphopelectronica” until it’s time for the next road trip. Sources say the Athens Arena is “surprisingly crunk,” so the bill should be a good fit.

Tony Floyd

WHO: Pretty Lights, Emancipator WHERE: Athens Arena WHEN: Friday, Sept. 4 HOW MUCH: $20, $40 (VIP Package)

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here could still be time to get your dancing shoes polished and your hippie headband dry-cleaned, but a bit of advice, if I may—don’t worry about it! By the time Colorado’s Pretty Lights drop the first groove on the human sea at Athens Arena, chances are you’ll be delightfully slippery already. Event producers Music Matters and the Georgia Theatre have taken conscious action to see to that. In fact, if you shell(ed) out the $40 for VIP tickets, you’ll probably be sweatin’ on the shuttle bus as you crunkenly ride from the pre-party at New Earth Music Hall out to the venue, somewhere near the mall. And even if you didn’t pick up the deluxe tickets, it’d probably still be worth your while to arrange a chauffeur ‘cause you’re gonna be high as a kite when you walk out, even if you’re dedicated to sobriety. You will not be able to stand still.

Pretty Lights were last in our neck of the woods back in February, and people who made it out to the Georgia Theatre that night no doubt have amorphous, glorious memories of the evening’s exuberance. But the duo’s color man, producer Derek Vincent Smith, claims their imminent 46-day tour will be the deepest glimpse of what the group is aiming for that audiences have yet had the opportunity to witness.

“We’d been playing only like weekend-long tours, so it was sometimes hard to get completely immersed in the music, having to focus a lot on the mechanics of putting on a show. But now we’ve got the tour set up, and we’re just gonna be on the road for a while, so we can really get wilder with the shows and try some new stuff.” So, what does Smith have in mind for Athens? A lot of lights and a lot of enthusiasm. “We were originally going to do two days at the Georgia Theatre,” says Smith, “but then the tragedy happened, and we had to figure something else out. We didn’t want to skip Athens because we have a lot of support there, and the Georgia Theatre was one of the best places to play in the country, really.”

Despite the cleverness of the notion that Smith could, in all honesty, put the phrase “making the air hot” somewhere in the skills/previous experience section of his résumé, those who

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For more of the unconventional, stop by newbelgium.com.

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

19

the calendar!

WHAT’S HAPPENING THIS WEEK

LABOR Day DeadlinE: The deadline for getting listed in the Calendar will be WEDNESDAY, Sept. 2 at 5 p.m. for the issue that comes out the following Wednesday. Email calendar@flagpole.com.

Tuesday 1 EVENTS: UGA Relay for Life Kickoff (New Earth Music Hall) Feel free to wear your smoothest ‘80s duds to this Cancer Society Benefit.

Music by Velvet Runway, free food and the chance to learn about getting involved with Relay for Life. 8 p.m.

Donations welcome. www.ugarelay. org www.newearthmusichall.com PERFORMANCE: UGA Recital (UGA Ramsey Concert Hall) Michael Heald, violin. 8 p.m. FREE! www. music.uga.edu LECTURES & LIT.: Clela Reed (Borders Books & Music) Long-time local resident shares her first book of poetry, Dancing on the Rim. 7 p.m. FREE! 706-583-8647 GAMES: Drunken Bingo (283 Bar) Great prizes and fun all night long.

10 p.m. FREE! 706-208-1283 GAMES: Locos Trivia (Locos Grill & Pub) All three Athens locations of Locos Grill and Pub (Westside, Eastside and Harris St.) feature trivia night every Tuesday. 8:30 p.m.

FREE! www.locosgrill.com

Wednesday 2 EVENTS: Cask Ale (Copper Creek Brewing Company) The brewpub is offering up a cask of their Oatmeal Stout as well as two tickets to the 2010 Atlanta Cask Ale Tasting. 6 p.m. FREE! www.classiccitybrew.com EVENTS: Night of Color (8e’s Bar) Haircolor expo hosted by Karma Salon. Register to win prizes and discounts. 9:30 p.m. FREE! 706353-8515, www.karmacolor.com PERFORMANCE: Queers in Alliance (New Earth Music Hall) Kings and Queens drag troupes come together for one over-the-top performance. 8 p.m. $5. www.newearthmusichall.com PERFORMANCE: UGA Recital (UGA Ramsey Concert Hall) Spencer Smith, percussion. 3:35 p.m. FREE! www.music.uga.edu KIDSTUFF: Children’s Storytime (ACC Library) For children ages 18 months to 5 years. Tuesdays, 9:30 a.m., Wednesdays, 10:30 a.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 KIDSTUFF: Eatin’ with the Critters (Sandy Creek Nature Center, ENSAT) Bring a sack lunch for an hour of learning about our world and the animals that inhabit it. For ages 3–5 with an adult. Call to register. 12:30 p.m. $0–$13 (scholarships available). 706-613-3615 MEETINGS: American Sign Language Study Group (Cups Coffee Café) All skill levels welcome.

Come once or come weekly. Meets Wednesdays. 7–8 p.m. FREE! www. myspace.com/aslstudygroup GAMES: Sports Trivia (Beef O’ Brady’s) Every Wednesday. 8:30 p.m.

FREE! 706-850-1916

20

GAMES: Trivia (Willy’s Mexicana Grill) Every Wednesday. 8–10 p.m.

FREE! 706-548-1920 GAMES: Trivia (Blind Pig Tavern) Think you know it all? 9:30 p.m.

706-548-3442 GAMES: Trivia Wars (283 Bar) “If you know your stuff you can win great stuff.” 9 p.m. FREE! 706-2081283

Thursday 3 KIDSTUFF: Chapter Book Review (Madison County Library) Every Tuesday and Thursday elementary school-aged children meet in the lobby to read aloud and share thoughts about books. 4:30 p.m.

FREE! 706-795-5597 MEETINGS: Athens Art Association (Lyndon House Arts Center) Painter Carl Ealy and Poet Phil Martz present at this season’s first meeting. Program followed by business meeting. Light refreshments. Non-members welcome. 7–9 p.m. FREE! villella@uga.edu MEETINGS: GLOBES Fall Reception (UGA Founders Memorial Garden) Reception to welcome new and returning faculty, staff, students and community members to campus for the new academic year. The mission of GLOBES is to advocate for, develop and nurture UGA’s LGBTQ communities. 5:30–8 p.m. FREE! cwjohns@uga.edu MEETINGS: Oconee Rivers Audubon Society (Sandy Creek Nature Center, ENSAT) Learn about wildlife and bird happenings in the Athens area. 7 p.m. FREE! 706613-9875 GAMES: Pool Tournament (Fat Daddy’s) 7 p.m. 706-353-0241 GAMES: Texas Hold ‘Em (Club Chrome) Every Thursday night. 8 p.m. FREE! 706-543-9009 GAMES: Trivia (WOW Café & Wingery) Every Thursday. 706-5435510 GAMES: Trivia (El Azteca) Every Thursday. Prizes! 8 p.m. 706-5492639

Friday 4 EVENTS: Sock Hop (Buffalo’s Southwest Café) Do the twist, shag and other popular dances of the ‘50s and ‘60s. Wear your poodle skirt, saddle shoes, penny loafers or pedal pushers to win a prize. Every Friday.

7 p.m. FREE! 706-354-6655 ART: The Next to Last RecessionProof Art and Music Show (White Tiger Gourmet Food & Chocolates) For exhibit featuring the work of Todd Diedrich, Will Donaldson and Heather Kohlberger.

Dinner, free refreshments and performances by Theo Hilton of Nana Grizol and Colby Carter of Mouser. See Calendar Pick on p.

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

24. 6–9 p.m. FREE! 706-540-0206, www.nexttolastfest.com ART: Opening Reception (Flicker Theatre & Bar) For paintings by Eric Simmons. 6 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/flickerbar ART: Reception (Lamar Dodd School of Art) For “Divergent Impressions,” the 2009 Printmaking Invitational, featuring the work of Sarah Bryant, Leslie Mutchler, Matthew Sugarman and Jason Urban. 7–9 p.m. FREE! www.art.uga.edu OUTDOORS: Courteous Mass (Athens City Hall) A casualpace bike ride around town with BikeAthens. Bring a helmet and water. 6 p.m. FREE! www.bikeathens. com MEETINGS: Happy Hoop Hour (Canopy Studio) Hooping fun with friends. Unwind from the week and chat while practicing your hoopdance skills. No formal instruction is provided. 7–8 p.m. $5. www.athenshoopdance.wordpress.com

Saturday 5 EVENTS: Athens Farmers’ Market (Bishop Park) Buy fresh, locally grown organic produce, locally crafted goods and freshly baked breads. Every Saturday. 8 a.m.–12 p.m. athensfarmersmarket.net EVENTS: Bouldering Competition (Active Climbing, 665 Barber St.) Compete in the first American Bouldering Series at Athens’ first indoor rock climbing facility. 10 a.m.–2 p.m. (youths), 5–9 p.m. (adults). $25. 404-277-1657, adrian@activeclimbing.com EVENTS: New Cask Release (Terrapin Beer Co.) The brewmaster gets creative with a new cask the first Saturday of every month on the tour.

5:30–7:30 p.m. $8/tasting glass. www.terrapinbeer.com EVENTS: Saturday Stroll (Oconee County Courthouse) Melvin Davis, Chairman of the Oconee County Board of Commisioners, will lead an informal, hour-long stroll in Watkinsville. 9 a.m. $5. oconeedemocrats.org EVENTS: Second Annual Harvest Moon Dinner (Athens Land Trust, 685 N. Pope St.) Five & Ten’s Hugh Acheson and The National’s Peter Dale prepare a four-course meal with wine to benefit the Athens Land Trust. Call for details. 6:30 p.m. 706613-0122, www.athenslandtrust.org ART: Perspectives Pottery Demonstrations (Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation) As part of the Perspectives Georgia Pottery Invitational, participants will demonstrate wheel-thrown pottery techniques. 10 a.m.–4 p.m. FREE! www.ocaf.com PERFORMANCE: Comedy Night (Flicker Theatre & Bar) Comedy from Disney Herpes and Amanda Burk follows the screening of The

Jason Urban’s screenprint is part of the “Divergent Impressions: Printmaking Invitational” show at the Lamar Dodd School of Art through Sept. 15.

Lord’s Ears Are Listenin’, a short film

by Josh Skinner. 8:30 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/flickerbar OUTDOORS: Dog Day (Ben Burton Park) Canines can bring their humans out for an afternoon of fun and games. 2–3:30 p.m. $2. Call to register. 706-613-3615.

OUTDOORS: Naturalist Walk (Sandy Creek Nature Center) Join SCNC staff for a walk around the property. Bring a camera or binoculars. All ages; children under 13 must be accompanied by an adult.

Call to register. 10 a.m. FREE! 706613-3615

Sunday 6 EVENTS: Athens Heritage Walks (Call for location) Winterville councilwoman and mayor pro tem Mary Quinn leads this walking tour of Winterville’s Historic District.

Space is limited; call to reserve spot.

2 p.m. $15. 706-353-1801, www. achfonline.org ART: Perspectives Pottery Demonstrations (Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation) A part of the Perspectives Georgia Pottery Invitational, participants will demonstrate wheel-thrown pottery techniques. 12–4 p.m. FREE! www. ocaf.com GAMES: Full-Contact Trivia (Allen’s Bar & Grill) Sports-themed rules within diverse categories. 9 p.m. FREE! www.allensbarandgrill. com GAMES: Team Trivia (Wild Wing Café) Every Sunday. FREE! www. wildwingcafe.com

Monday 7 EVENTS: Celebration of Workers’ Rights (Various Locations) The 5th Annual Labor Day celebration organized by The Economic Justice Coalition, Inc. features a light dinner, speakers, a documentary film, music, art and more. Call for tickets and information. 706-549-1142 OUTDOORS: Bike Ride (Main Street Yarns) A leisurely ride to Bishop (8ish miles) and back. Every Monday.

6:15 p.m. FREE! 706-769-5531 MEETINGS: Zen Meditation and Book Discussion (Email for Location) The Key by Cheri Huber.

Meets every Monday. 7:15 p.m.

FREE! meditateathens@gmail.com GAMES: Darts (Broad Street Bar and Grill) Blind Draw Darts Tournament.

Every Monday. 10 p.m. 706-5485187 GAMES: Live Trivia (Buffalo’s Southwest Café) Every Monday with Trivia Joe. Winning teams have a chance to qualify for a $200 cash prize. 7 p.m. FREE! 706-354-6655 GAMES: Rock and Roll Trivia (Little Kings Shuffle Club) Show off your extensive music knowledge every Monday! 8 p.m. FREE! www. myspace.com/littlekingsshuffleclub GAMES: Sports Trivia (WOW Café & Wingery) Every Monday. 706543-5510.

GAMES: Team Trivia (Beef O’ Brady’s) Get a team together and test your knowledge. Every Monday!

8:30 p.m. FREE! 706-850-1916 GAMES: Texas Hold ‘Em (Fat Daddy’s) Every Monday. 6 & 9 p.m.

706-353-0241.

GAMES: Trivia (Transmetropolitan) General knowledge trivia. Every Monday. 8–10 p.m. FREE! 706613-8773 GAMES: Tune Trivia (Alibi) Test your knowledge of music trivia. Hosted

by Bobby Nettles. 9 p.m. FREE! 706549-1010

Tuesday 8 PERFORMANCE: Open TOAD Comedy (Flicker) A unique open mic experience. The audience gets to pelt the performers who go over their six-minute time limit with foam rocks. Performers get in free but must sign up by 8 p.m. 8:30 p.m. $5. www.myspace.com/flickerbar KIDSTUFF: Chapter Book Review (Madison County Library) Every Tuesday and Thursday elementary school-aged children meet in the lobby to read aloud and share thoughts about books. 4:30 p.m.

FREE! 706-795-5597 KIDSTUFF: Children’s Storytime (ACC Library) For children ages 18 months to 5 years. Tuesdays, 9:30 a.m., Wednesdays, 10:30 a.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 KIDSTUFF: Read to Rover (ACC Library) Beginning readers in grades 1–4 read aloud to an aid dog. Trainer always present. 3:30–4:30 p.m.

FREE! 706-613-3650 LECTURES & LIT.: AfricanAmerican Authors Book Club (ACC Library, Small Conference Room) September’s title is Naughty or Nice by Eric Jerome Dickey.

Newcomers welcome. 7 p.m. FREE! 706-613-3650

LECTURES & LIT.: Jim Fiscus (Lamar Dodd School of Art, Rm S151) Award-winning advertising and editorial photographer speaks as part of the Visiting Artist/Scholar Series. 5:30 p.m. FREE! www.art. uga.edu MEETINGS: Athens Health Care Town Hall (Oconee County Civic Center) U.S. Representative Paul Broun hosts this community health care discussion. 10 a.m. FREE! 706549-9588 GAMES: Drunken Bingo (283 Bar) Great prizes and fun all night long.

10 p.m. FREE! 706-208-1283 GAMES: Locos Trivia (Locos Grill & Pub) All three Athens locations of Locos Grill and Pub (Westside, Eastside and Harris St.) feature trivia night every Tuesday. 8:30 p.m.

FREE! www.locosgrill.com GAMES: Pool Tournament (Alibi) APA Pool League. 8 p.m. FREE! 706549-1010

Wednesday 9 EVENTS: PROBE College Fair (The Classic Center) Over 75 institutions attend this annual event to discuss admissions, scholarships and housing with parents and students.

6–8:30 p.m. FREE! www.gaprobe.org EVENTS: UGA Fall Activities Fair (UGA Tate Center) Over 150 student organizations will be represented at the Department of Campus Life’s annual event. Open to students, faculty and staff and members of the Athens community. 10:30 a.m.–3 p.m.

FREE! 706-542-8584, www.uga.edu/ stuorgs/ KIDSTUFF: Children’s Storytime (ACC Library) For children ages 18 months to 5 years. Tuesdays, 9:30 a.m., Wednesdays, 10:30 a.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 KIDSTUFF: Parent and Student Orientation (ACC Library) Explore the library’s various resources in this hour-long tour. Call for times. FREE! 706-613-3650 KIDSTUFF: Wildcard Wednesday for Teens (ACC Library) Up next: Munchkin Cthulu. Love Lovecraft?

You’ll love this game. Ages 11–18.

4:00 p.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 MEETINGS: American Sign Language Study Group (Cups Coffee Café) All skill levels welcome.

Come once or come weekly. 7–8 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/ aslstudygroup GAMES: Sports Trivia (Beef O’ Brady’s) Every Wednesday. 8:30 p.m.

FREE! 706-850-1916 GAMES: Trivia (Willy’s Mexicana Grill) Every Wednesday. 8–10 p.m.

FREE! 706-548-1920 GAMES: Trivia (Blind Pig Tavern) 9:30 p.m. 706-548-3442 GAMES: Trivia Wars (283 Bar) “If you know your stuff you can win great stuff.” 9 p.m. FREE! 706-2081283 * Advance Tickets Available

Down the Line ART: Gallery Talk 9/10 (Lyndon House Arts Center) Paul Manoguerra, curator of American art, leads a public tour of “Lord Love You: Works by R.A. Miller from the Mullis Collection.” 2 p.m. FREE! 706-613-3623 EVENTS: Volunteer Service Expo 9/10 (The Classic Center) Pick your cause and volunteer with over 100 local nonprofits to choose from.

12–7 p.m. www.athensvolunteerserviceexpo.org PERFORMANCE: UGA Symphony Orchestra 9/10 (UGA Hodgson Hall) Stravinsky and Brahms. 8

p.m. $15. 706-542-4400, www.uga. edu/pac* EVENTS: Tailgate Cookoff 9/11 (Wray-Nicholson House) The UGA Alumni Association hosts this competition as a prelude to the football season. WSB-TV meteorologist David Chandley emcees with a panel of guest judges. 5:30 p.m. $60/team, $3/sample. www.uga.edu/alumni, 706-542-2251 THEATRE: A Celebration of George Bernard Shaw & Oscar Wilde 9/11 (Seney-Stovall Chapel) JV Productions presents scenes from The Importance of Being Earnest, Pygmalion, Lady Windermere’s Fan and Arms & the Man as well as the performance of Shaw’s short play Village Wooing.

Sept. 11, 8 p.m. Sept. 13, 2p.m.

706-543-2012.

EVENTS: Classic City Rollergirls Bout 9/12 (Skate-A-Round USA) The Classic City Rollergirls take on the Dixie Derby Girls from Huntsville, AL. 7 p.m. $10 (adults), $5 (ages 6–10), FREE! (ages 5 & under). www.classiccityrollergirls. com* KIDSTUFF: Parent/Child Workshop 9/17 (ACC Library, Storyroom) For children ages 1–3 and their caregivers. Registration begins Sept. 8. 10–11 a.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 ART: Gypsy Artist Market 9/19 (Lyndon House Arts Center) Unique open air market featuring eclectic wares by artists of all ages. Local artists demonstrating their craft: wood turning, printmaking, pottery, photography, floral design, painting, quilting and more. 10 a.m.–4 p.m.

FREE! 706-613-3623 ART: Opening Reception 9/19 (ATHICA) For “Free Press in Free Fall,” featuring the work of 13 artists addressing the current state of the American news media. Sept. 19, 7–9 p.m. www.athica.org EVENTS: Grace’s Birthday Party 9/20 (Ashford Manor, Watkinsville) Luau-themed benefit for UGA Vet Hospital and local animal advocacy groups. Featuring costumes, art, games, picnic supper, adoptions and more. Guests are encouraged to donate an unopened bag of dog food for rescue groups. 2–5 p.m. $5 (adults), FREE! (dogs). www.gracesbirthday.com ART: Athens Artists Clearance Sale 9/26 (Chase Street Warehouses) Young, Foxy & Free magazine and local artists team up to sell their wares. Sep. 26. 12–7 p.m. mattblanksart@gmail.com LECTURES & LIT.: Pipo Nguyenduy 9/29 (Lamar Dodd School of Art, Rm S151) Photographer Pipo Nguyen-duy, whose recent work explores “humanity in the context of the post-apocalyptic landscape” speaks as part of the Visiting Artist/ Scholar Series. 5:30 p.m. FREE! www.art.uga.edu LECTURES & LIT.: “How Does a Shadow Shine?” 10/8 (Morton Theatre) The Georgia Review hosts a reading from Pulitzer Prize winner and former U.S. poet laureate Rita Dove. 7 p.m. FREE! www.thegeorgiareview.com PERFORMANCE: Robert Belinic 10/17 (UGA Hodgson Hall) Renowned Croatian guitarist performs. 8 p.m. $18. www.uga.edu/ pac* PERFORMANCE: Taikoza 10/18 (UGA Hodgson Hall) Internationally acclaimed Japanese dance and drum ensemble featuring a 6-foot long ancestral Taiko drum. 3 p.m. $20–$25.

706-542-4400, www.uga.edu/pac* EVENTS: The Art of: Music 10/20 (The Melting Point) The Georgia Museum of Art presents Grammy Award-winner Art Rosenbaum in

this old time and bluegrass music performance. Part of GMOA’s “The Art of…” series. Call to RSVP. 6–8 p.m. $20. 706-542-0830, www.uga. edu/gamuseum LECTURES & LIT.: Michael Fried 10/20 (Lamar Dodd School of Art, Rm S151) The poet, art historian and art and literary critic speaks as part of the Visiting Artist/Scholar Series.

5:30 p.m. FREE! www.art.uga.edu PERFORMANCE: Lynn Harrell 10/24 (UGA Hodgson Hall) Awardwinning cellist performs as a part of UGA Performing Arts Center’s Music Series II. 8 p.m. $23–$28. 706-5424400, www.uga.edu/pac* PERFORMANCE: Atlanta Symphony Orchestra 11/5 (UGA Hodgson Hall) Conductor Robert Spano conducts Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 and Stravinsky’s Nightingale. 8 p.m. $37–42. 706542-4400, www.uga.edu/pac* * Advance Tickets Available

Live Music Tuesday 1 Alibi FREE! 706-549-1010 J TUNES KARAOKE DANCE PARTY Every Tuesday.

Buffalo’s Southwest Café 6–10 p.m. $5 (includes lessons). 706354-6655 DINE & DANCE NIGHT Beginners and advanced dance lessons every Tuesday from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. followed by open dance until 10 p.m.

Tonight features swing dancing hosted by Bugg.

8 p.m. FREE! 706-354-6655 TIM ENGLISH Acoustic guitar performance in the front bar.

Caledonia Lounge 9:30 p.m. $5 (21+), $7 (18+). www. caledonialounge.com THE DESPISED This Atlanta outfit plays straightforward, “I’m-going-topunch-you-in-the-face” hardcore.

THE SETTING Pop rock filled with energetic melodies and catchy hooks.

UTAH Head-banging three-piece featuring Wil “Mantooth” Smith on guitar, venturing through rapid tempo changes and monster riffs.

Farm 255 10 p.m. FREE! www.farm255.com CARL LINDBERG Jazz bassist Carl Lindberg (Grogus, Squat, Kenosha Kid, etc.) performs standards, originals and some surprising tunes from divergent styles.

junkman's daughter's brother 458 east clayton st.

706|543| 4454

Make your laptop a looker

Fat Daddy’s 10 p.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 KARAOKE Huge karaoke dance party hosted by Lynn every Tuesday.

Go Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/gobar BANG-UTOT Members of Stegosaurus, Nero + the Burning Violins and Fashion Knee High mix things up with this new, high energy punk rock trio.

COLUMBOID New York “ghettotech” group with plenty of lo-fi synth riffs and bass drums to go around.

FLORIDA This Brooklyn psych band provides sensible guitar background over which they drone their dischordant yet oddly pleasing vocal harmonies.

MOTHS Featuring Jacob Morris of Ham1, Moths plays a mostly acoustic sort of ‘70s folk-rock with k continued on next page

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THE CALENDAR! a pop sensibility and an inevitable psychedelic tinge.

The Melting Point 7 p.m. $3. www.meltingpointathens. com JOHNNY ROQUEMORE & THE APOSTLES OF BLUEGRASS This Atlanta trio plays a rowdy blend of bluegrass that is full of quirky humor and riotous one-liners.

Tuesday, Sep. 1 continued from p. 21

change–channeling alternative rock and pop sounds from across the decades.

SOMEDAY STATIC Female-fronted rock band that’s a little bit Avril and a little bit Evanescence.

Fat Daddy’s 10 p.m.–1 a.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 OPEN MIC Every Wednesday featuring Avery Dylan.

Tasty World Uptown 10 p.m. $5. 706-543-0797 AMERICAN NIGHT Host Clay Leverett presents local Americana artists Bo Bedingfield and Ibilisi Takedown.

Gnat’s Landing 6 p.m. FREE! 706-850-5858 DAVID PRINCE This Athens staple and one-time member of The Jesters plays your favorite soul, rock and R&B oldies.

Wild Wing Café 10 p.m. FREE! www.wildwingcafe.com KARAOKE Every Tuesday night at the downtown wing chain’s upstairs space.

Go Bar 10 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/ gobar BUBBLEGUM OCTOPUS Rapid fire electropop with hints of Man Man and loads of fun.

THE ORKIDS Local electropop group guaranteed to get you dancing.

RAT BABIES Athens duo Rat Babies plays hit-you-in-the-gut dirt metal, care of Mux on bass, Chodd on drums, and an assortment of other collaborators.

YATAGARASU Experimental group composes blistery soundscapes with jarring arrangements and effusive basses.

Wednesday 2 Alibi 9 p.m. FREE! 706-456-0840 ZHAIN This band from Yorkshire, England sounds surprisingly American playing straightahead rock and roll influenced by acts like AC/ DC, Van Halen and Guns N’ Roses.

Caledonia Lounge 9:30 p.m. $5 (21+), $7 (18+). www. caledonialounge.com CELERITY Punk-inspired hard rock.

DAYS OF HYSTERIA Local metal band formerly known as Stereo Gun. LEADING EDGE The local band formerly known as Mudra has gotten a bit more upbeat since the name

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Harry Bissett’s Bayou Grill 8 p.m. FREE! 706-552-1193 KIP JONES TRIO Many of Jones’ tunes split between the reflective acoustic territory of Harvest-era Neil Young and the country-infused rock of ‘80s-era Steve Earle.

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

Locos Grill & Pub 6:30 p.m. FREE! 706-549-7700 RICK FOWLER TRIO Local guitarist Rick Fowler (of Lonely White Boys, Ralph Roddenbery, etc.) specializes in a classic sort of British blues rock.

The Melting Point 9 p.m. $5. www.meltingpointathens. com HALF DOZEN BRASS BAND Highly praised local ensemble, and Athens’ only New Orleans-style brass band, claims Rebirth, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band and Youngblood Brass Band as influences.

LEFTY HATHAWAY Local singersongwriter Lefty Hathaway plays rock and roll soul with turbulent piano jams reminiscent of the late, great Lowell George and fellow Tulsan JJ Cale. He’ll be joined onstage by openers the Half Dozen Brass Band, combining forces under the new name “Yokozuna.”

The Office Lounge 9:30 p.m. FREE! 706-549-0840 KARAOKE Every Wednesday with Stan.

Rye Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/ryebarathens A DARKER SHADE This local duo performs smooth, acoustic folk rock with an appreciation for pop arrangements.

MATTHEW POP Melodic rocker who names The Beatles, Cheap Trick and Weezer as key influences.

Tasty World Uptown Townthology Launch Party. 10 p.m. $5. www.tastyworld.net KYSHONA ARMSTRONG Local songstress Kyshona sings soulful

ballads over acoustic guitar. She’ll be joined tonight by special guest Richard Sherfey for some fun covers!

DJ DECEPTICRON Hosting a late night dance party.

DEERBEARBLACK AND THE JAPANGRY TIGERS Local hip-hop group promises “smooth rhymes over ridiculous beats.” Get ready for some “Pretty Prancin’” which promises to be the new dance craze…

RICHARD SHERFEY & ALL GOD’S CHILDREN All God’s Children includes members of the bands Hey, Revolution! and Modern Skirts.

Sherfey trucks in some squarely American, impassioned pop-rock songs.

Thursday 3 283 Bar 10:30 p.m. FREE! 706-208-1283 DJ ELTON COUGAR Join DJ Elton for Ladies’ Night featuring your favorite dance hits.

40 Watt Club Georgia Theatre Presents. 10 p.m. $10. www.40watt.com VERY DISCO Daft Punk tribute led by Alfredo Lapuz, Jr. (AKA Immuzikation).

Alibi Thursdays, FREE! 706-549-1010 OPEN MIC/JAM Hosted by Tracy Carroll and Matt Joiner of The Rattlers. Open to all musicians.

Caledonia Lounge 10 p.m. $5 (21+), $7 (18+). www.caledonialounge.com BAMBARA Local power trio has a sound that draws from both the atmospherics of bands like Slowdive

and the ferocity of bands like Fugazi.

This is the band’s homecoming show after a summer spent in Europe! See Calendar Pick on p. 23.

HAMMER NO MORE THE FINGERS Off-kilter power-pop trio that borrows equally from Weezer and The Strokes.

MARRIAGE Truly unclassifiable local Christian sludge-rock trio experiments with every heavy and bizarre sound it can muster.

Club Chrome 9 p.m. FREE! 706-543-9009 KARAOKE Every Thursday night!

Farm 255 10 p.m. FREE! www.farm255.com LERA LYNN The tender, jazzy folk voice behind Birds+Wire performs a solo set.

Fat Daddy’s 10 p.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 KARAOKE Hosted by Lynn!

Flicker Theatre & Bar 8:30 p.m. $5. www.myspace.com/ flickerbar MARK CUNNINGHAM Helen, Dodge main man performs acoustic Americana solo.

Go Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/gobar “DR. FRED’S KARAOKE” Hosted by karaoke fanatic John “Dr. Fred” Bowers.

SMEGMA Featuring members of scrappy punk band Rockspring Destroyers.

The Melting Point 9 p.m. $5. www.meltingpointathens. com BEN DEIGNAN This Atlanta singersongwriter has drawn comparisons

to a young John Mayer with his energetic blues-rock compositions.

New Earth Music Hall 8 p.m. FREE! www.newearthmusichall. com HOUSE PARTY Come dance the night away at New Earth’s Thursday night party.

Tasty World Uptown Midnight. FREE! www.myspace.com/ tastyworlduptown PUDDIN’ TANG Upbeat, quirky and stripped-down, Puddin’ Tang plays rootsy garage rock in the vein of Von Bondies.

Terrapin Beer Co. 5:30 p.m. www.terrapinbeer.com CURLEY MAPLE Fiddler David Blackmon’s progressive old-time project. He’s joined by wife Noel and Christian Lopez on mandolin and guitar, and Chris Enghauser on bass.

Wild Wing Café 9 p.m. FREE! www.wildwingcafe.com JUSTIN BROGDON Justin Brogdon puts a lot of Southern soul into his epic songs, drawing from artists like The Black Crowes and Tom Petty.

His all-American sound owes a lot to his all-star backing band.

Friday 4 40 Watt Club 10 p.m. FREE! www.40watt.com HEARTBREAKERS DANCE PARTY Featuring “20 DJs”—with a massive crew of local party starters taking turns behind the decks (and/or iPod/laptop). Expect appearances by Twin Powers, DJs Rapedogg, Nate Nelson and many more as we dance our way into Labor Day weekend.

Charles-Ryan Barber

Thursday, September 3

Bambara, Marriage, Hammer No More the Fingers

Theatre

Caledonia Lounge Though the band has been making music since 2001, the psychedelic post-rock trio of William Brookshire and brothers Blaze and Reid Bateh has only recently been making waves here in the Bambara Athens music scene. After releasing its well-received self-titled debut, the threesome hit the club circuit hard and fast, gaining a quick following through sheer musical aptitude and hard work. Bambara recently returned from a summer abroad in Europe, where hanging out and apparently getting naked were the order of the day, as drummer Blaze Bateh recalls. “It was awesome; we hopped trains around the continent until the euro beat us to the ground. We played a couple shows, met some cool people, ate a lot of ham, and William stripped down and jumped off of the Rialto Bridge in Venice.”

Though they say any manner of things influence their music, from “sad shit to a strong Nor’easter headwind,” the music of Bambara isn’t a whirlwind cocktail of sounds and emotions but a well-constructed arrangement of melodies and aural sensations.

An amalgam of artists as diverse as Fugazi, Talk Talk and Nick Cave shape the sound of Bambara, a fusion of aggressive psychedelic distortion and haunting atmospherics.

Encouraged by the success of its debut, Bambara has plans to release a new EP in the near future.

“We are recording a few songs with Joel Hatstat at The Bakery and a couple with David Barbe at Chase Park,” says Blaze. “Musically it’s a lot further down the same path.

There is a lot more atmosphere, both somber and violent. There is a lot more enveloping noise and more developed takes on the jagged and the smooth [parts] than our previous album.”

It’ll be interesting to see the contrast between the band’s prior efforts and this latest endeavor, but for now, fans can catch the band around Athens as it gears up for upcoming shows. [Charley Lee]

Alibi 9 p.m. FREE! (706) 549-1010 ROCK, ROLL AND RIDE Southern rock music featuring Avery Dylan as guest guitar player and “Magic” Mike Stone on harmonica. Playing blues, soul and Southern rock.

Allen’s Bar & Grill Allen’s 50th Birthday! 9 p.m. FREE! www.allensbarandgrill.com NORMALTOWN FLYERS This Athens roots-rock institution plays a set of good-time rock and roll with a Southern leaning.

American Legion 8 p.m. 706-743-8267 THE HEALERS Local bona fide hardcore blues band recently re-formed with its original lineup: Donny Ray Simonds, John Straw, John Davis, Jimmy Bolman and Steve Harding.

Athens Arena Presented by the Georgia Theatre. 9 p.m. $20. 706-353-2772* EMANCIPATOR Doug Appling is a producer/multi-instrumentalist who creates adventurous electronica.

PRETTY LIGHTS Colorado DJ duo and a live drummer weave a relaxing web of electronica and classic hiphop. See story on p. 19 Broad Street Bar and Grill 10 p.m. FREE! 706-548-5187 REDSTONE RAMBLERS Country and old time bluegrass originals and covers. This local three-piece features members of Samurai Trout.

Performing every Friday!

Caledonia Lounge 10 p.m. $5 (21+), $7 (18+). www.caledonialounge.com THE GINGER ENVELOPE Patrick Carey’s slow-rolling countryish pop

is marked by breezy, melodic sounds with chiming acoustic and electric notes and vocal melodies, rounded out by Jason Robira, Stephen Miller, Matt Stoessel and Jason Trahan.

MAGIC MISSILE Jake Mosely’s main songwriting vehicle for pop songs about the periodic table of the elements and other quirky topics.

Musically influenced by acts like Guided by Voices.

NOW YOU SEE THEM Asheville band promises “super fun acoustic indie folk!”

Club Chrome 9 p.m. $5. 706-543-9009 THE BIG DON BAND Don Spurlin’s band delivers “workingman’s blues from a country perspective” with a catalog of Southern blues covers and originals.

Farm 255 11 p.m. FREE! www.farm255.com JUST THESE DUDES Reunion show!

Athens’ favorite (if slightly ironic) cover band (circa 2004) is back!

Featuring Jeff Tobias (PegasusesXL, We Vs. the Shark), Adam Newman (Coulier), Robert Gunn (An Epic at Best) and Scott Smith (We Vs. the Shark) covering the poppiest ‘90s alternative hits.

Fat Daddy’s 9 p.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 COMMON PEOPLE BAND Local band pays tribute to Motown’s greatest hits.

Flicker Theatre & Bar 9 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/ flickerbar HOLA HALO Sparkling keys, heavenly vocals and crunchy ‘70s guitar riffs drive this melodic local act. Make sure to pick a copy of the band’s beautiful new album Time Out Here.

Go Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/gobar DJ MAHOGANY Freaky funk, sultry soul, righteous R&B, and a whole lotta unexpected faves as DJ Mahogany dips into his bag of goodies from the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s.

Harmony Grove Grille 8:30 p.m. FREE! www.harmonygrovegrille.com BLUEBILLY GRIT Live bluegrass at this Commerce bar and restaurant.

Little Kings Shuffle Club 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/littlekingsshuffleclub A POSTWAR DRAMA Local act plays folk-rock with an occasional eastern European bent. Dramatic tales of loss and hardship are mixed with driving, upbeat stomps.

TIMBER Frontman Daniel Aaron serves up his brand of hangoverfriendly country rock. His lyricfocused arrangements are often nestled within minimalist instrumentation, incorporating the fiddle, piano, pedal steel and xylophone.

The Melting Point 9 p.m. $7 (adv), $10 (door). www.meltingpointathens.com THE HOLMAN AUTRY BAND Described as “a little bit of Hank, a little bit of Metallica, and a healthy dose of Southern rock,” fans of bands like the Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd can’t go wrong here.

The Budweiser Select Music Series at The Classic Center Theatre presents

The Derek Trucks Band Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2009 8 p.m.

With Very Special Guests JJ Grey and Mofro Call, click or stop by the Box Office 706.357.4444 • www.ClassicCenter.com 300 N. Thomas St., Downtown Athens The Budweiser Select Music Series at The Classic Center is brought to you by:

New Earth Music Hall Pretty Lights Pre-Party! 5–10 p.m.

FREE! www.newearthmusichall.com CAPTAIN CRUNK This Atlanta DJ spins danceable grooves.

CROOKHAVEN Electro-dubstep rhythms. Spinning tomorrow night for the inaugural L.F. Oh Yeah!!! k continued on next page

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THE CALENDAR! WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 3

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 4

T8R(TOT) Local beatmaster mixes trippy electronic laptop creations featuring dubstep, drum ‘n’ bass and funk.

10 p.m. FREE! www.newearthmusichall. com AZ-IZ Adrian Zelski of DubConscious spins nothing but the funk.

BEAT BABY Shannon Chubon, AKA Beat Baby, has teamed up with Heather B to form a strong feminine force in the Atlanta dance community. Music ranges from electro/ house/indie/dub.

The Office Lounge 8:30 p.m. 706-546-0840 KARAOKE It’s your chance to be the star!

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 5

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 10

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 13

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16

Rye Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/ryebarathens BRIDGEWATER BAND Soulful country from Oklahoma City that masterfully mixes acoustic and electric guitars, fiddle and fiery vocals from the female singer. Also playing at Allen’s tomorrow night.

VINYL Throwback classic rock sounds shooting for something along the lines of Skynyrd or Van Halen.

Square One Fish Co. Full Moon Party. 6 p.m. www.squareonefishco.com LAISSEZ FUNK Local up-and-comers play funk-jam fusion plus a variety of covers. Set starts at 9:30 p.m.

TROPICAL BREEZE STEEL BAND This local outfit is exactly what it claims to be: a spicy, tropical band whose melodic emphasis is entirely in its proficient steel drum section.

Expect jazz and reggae influences, dipped in their own brand of salsa.

Tasty World Uptown 9 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/tastyworlduptown THE JOHN SOSEBEE BAND These Georgia natives play electric blues and the occasional Hendrix cover.

LULLWATER This local rock band offers high energy and solid melodies that pull from both alternative music and acoustic folk.

Terrapin Beer Co. 5:30 p.m. 706-549-3377 DODD FERRELLE Athenian Dodd Ferrelle pours heart and soul into his sweeping, anthemic ballads and alt-country rockers.

COMING SOON

White Tiger Gourmet Food & Chocolates Next to Last Festival Benefit. 6 p.m.

FREE! 706-353-6847 COLBY CARTER Mouser frontman plays an acoustic set.

THEO HILTON Nana Grizol frontman plays an acoustic set. See Calendar Pick on p. 24.

Wild Wing Café 9 p.m. FREE! www.wildwingcafe.com THE UNMENTIONABLES Rock covers and originals.

WUGA 91.7 FM 4 p.m. FREE! www.wuga.org “IT’S FRIDAY!” Packway Handle Band and Lera Lynn will perform on the local radio station’s weekly program. University Cable Channel 15 will also broadcast the show.

Saturday 5 40 Watt Club 9 p.m. $5. www.40watt.com THE GOODFIGHT Indie rockers from across the pond offer a light, ethereal sound.

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Friday, Sep. 4 continued from p. 23

LEAVING ARABY Pop-rock quartet with a style akin to yesteryear radio sweethearts Goo Goo Dolls, Gin Blossoms and the like.

THE WARM FUZZIES Weezerinspired quirky local pop-rock outfit whose last release, the Bubblegum EP, features scratch-and-sniff artwork.

Allen’s Bar & Grill Allen’s 50th Birthday! 9 p.m. FREE! www.allensbarandgrill.com BRIDGEWATER BAND Soulful country from Oklahoma City that masterfully mixes acoustic and electric guitars, fiddle and firey vocals from the female vocalist. Also playing Rye Bar on Friday, Sept. 4.

Athens Farmers Market 8 a.m. FREE! 706-296-8000 FIDDLE-DW Bluegrass! (10 a.m.)

THE MUSICSMITHS Natalie Smith of Grogus and husband Brian Smith of the Georgia Guitar Quarter put together eerily beautiful flute/guitar compositions. Their version of “Ave Maria” is to die for.

Caledonia Lounge Presented by Hello Sir Records. 10 p.m. $6 (21+), $8 (18+). www.caledonialounge.com A. ARMADA Athens’ A. Armada plays energetic, epic, instumental indie rock. The band’s Anam Cara EP takes things in a cinematic post-rock direction, with touches of Godspeed.

ANTARCTIC St. Augustine’s answer to A. Armada, featuring supremely tight, progressive instrumental rock with epic, thrashing climaxes.

THE BRONZED CHORUS Sweeping, guitar-filled instrumentals in the vein of Mogwai or Explosions in the Sky. Club Chrome 9 p.m. $5. 706-543-9009 DANIEL LEE BAND Four Georiga boys churning out country and Southern rock.

Farm 255 10 p.m. FREE! www.farm255.com LAISSEZ FUNK Local up-and-comers play funk-jam fusion plus covers.

Fat Daddy’s 9 p.m. 706-353-0241 BIG DANCE PARTY Spinning your favorite dance tunes all night.

Go Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/gobar “LATE NITE DISCO” The house deejay and occasional special guests spin a cool mix of disco, new wave and modern dance tunes for a sweaty and energetic closing-time crowd. Dance party begins after the live music every Saturday.

Little Kings Shuffle Club 10 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/ littlekingsshuffleclub CHOPTOP Local punk band that draws from an eclectic array of influences—from ska to hardcore.

DAFFODIL Trio Daffodil—Derek Wiggs, Zack Kennedy and Max Talkovich—plays fuzzed-out, early’90s sounding heavy rock and roll.

DEAD DOG Local band delivers frenetic, spunky lo-fi punk delivered with a pop smile. This is the band’s farewell show before heading off on a six-week tour! Come wish ‘em luck.

LIVERTY Christopher Ingham of Christopher’s Liver debuts his new band featuring Kater Reynolds on bass and Sarah T. on drums.

The Melting Point 8 p.m. $6 (adv), $8 (door). www.meltingpointathens.com HOLLY BELLE Atlanta singer-songwriter Belle sings smoky, acoustic ballads accompanied by cello.

JAZZENIGMA Melvin Mathurin (alto sax) plays jazz inspired by Coltrane, Freddie Hubbard and Kenny Garrett.

His current quartet includes Kevin Hyde (trombone), Robby Handley (bass) and Darren Stanley (drums).

MARTY WINKLER Jazz-folk pop singer, joined tonight by special guest Mitch Rothstein on piano, promises to bring a smile to your ears.

New Earth Music Hall 8 p.m. $5. www.newearthmusichall. com L.F. OH YEAH!!! INAUGURAL BALL Kicking off New Earth’s monthly dubstep party with local DJ SeaDub (it’s his birthday!), Charlie P. and special guests from Atlanta Crookhaven, D:RC and Distal.

Rye Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/ryebarathens GUS DARNELL Local up-and-coming rapper who cites Talib Kweli and the Wu-Tang Clan as influences.

Tasty World Uptown 9 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/tastyworlduptown DEAD RABBITS Bluesy duo from Atlanta inspired by ‘60s garage rock soul.

Friday, September 4

Next to Last Songs Listening Party and 2010 Festival Fundraiser White Tiger Gourmet There are several good reasons to show up at White Tiger Gourmet (on Hiawassee, off of Boulevard) on Friday, which is why it’s likely that fundraising efforts for the 2010 Next to Last Festival will get off to a fine start. Festival organizer Will Donaldson has exerted much effort to pack the night with compelling audio/visual springboards from which to launch the imagination and expand the social circle. And what’s this? There are prizes, too? Indeed. Several of which are donations from Theo Hilton Asthmatic Kitty, the label responsible for distributing creations from indie-rock heavyweights like Sufjan Stevens (and several other talented artists).

The festivities kick off promptly at 6 p.m., at which time the Next to Last Songs compilation (recorded mostly by Donaldson at the 2006 and 2007 Next to Last Festivals, and also conveniently for sale exclusively on site for $5 a pop in a limited run of 50 handmade copies) will be played in its entirety. During this time, the White Tiger kitchen will be open and accepting orders for their (expletive deleted)-good cuisine, and the visual art patrons of the city will be afforded the opportunity to check out some interesting photographs from Donaldson and Athens/Chicago resident Todd Diederich, as well as a few drawings and prints from Florida-escapee Heather Kohlberger.

When the CD has run to completion, guests will find themselves only at the apex of the evening’s events schedule, however; acoustic performances from Nana Grizol’s Theo Hilton and Mouser’s Colby Carter are set to take folks down the home stretch, and if past experiences provide reliable data, these should be some pleasant sets from two busy Athens musicians.

Show up around 6 p.m. to hear the compilation, and bring a few extra dollars to spread around the community like seeds, so we can grow more nice things of this nature.

[Tony Floyd]

KALVINOVA Self-proclaimed “scientists of sound,” these Valdosta altrockers craft sweeping soundscapes to back the standard guitar-vocaldrum combination.

THIS PIANO PLAYS ITSELF Spacey rock backed by a wall of reverb. The eponymous EP is out now.

TODAY THE MOON, TOMORROW THE SUN Endearing electro-rock from Atlanta featuring sweet and strong female vocals backed by fierce guitars. See Calendar Pick on p. 27.

Terrapin Beer Co. 5 p.m. www.terrapinbeer.com SUPER LUCKY CAT The current cast of musicians supporting singer/ songwriter Woody Garrison. They play ambient, psychedlic jam pop.

Garrison and his wife, fellow Lucky Cat Elizabeth, will soon move to Hawaii, so this may be one of fans’ final chances to catch them live.

Sunday 6 ACC Library 3 p.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 LIVE! AT THE LIBRARY Nationally known singer-songwriter Marty Winkler and musical partner Michael C. Steele bring their jazz and folk music to the library.

Buffalo’s Southwest Café 9 p.m. $8 (adv.), $10 (door). 706354-6655 GRITZ AND JELLY BUTTER Jazz band from Atlanta.

Jot ‘Em Down Country Store & BBQ 3–6 p.m. FREE! 706-549-2110 90 ACRE FARM This acoustic trio from Watkinsville plays original Americana and covers.

Square One Fish Co. 1-4 p.m. FREE! www.squareonefishco. com SUNDAY JAZZ BRUNCH Rotating local jazz artists play Sunday afternoons on the patio. This week: Carlton Owens Trio.

Monday 7 40 Watt Club Economic Justice Coalition Benefit. 9 p.m. $5. www.40watt.com HAM1 A breezy take on straight-ahead ‘60s garage rock, brightened by swoon-worthy harmonies and keen pop sensibilities.

INCATEPEC A combination of traditional tunes from South America and Cuba with a unique jazz twist.

ADRIAN ZELSKI DubConscious guitarist/vocalist plays an acoustic set.

Ashford Manor 6 p.m. $15. www.ambedandbreakfast. com* DIRK HOWELL Beachy ‘60s style rhythm and blues.

ADAM KLEIN This local singersongwriter’s latest release, Western Tales & Trails, features a blend of the finest elements of folk, Americana and country with poetic lyricism and striking imagery.

Ciné Barcafé 6–8:30 p.m. FREE! www.athenscine. com OPEN JAZZ JAM Calling all jazz musicians. Now you can join local jazz group Sonny Got Blue every Monday for an open mic jam.

Fat Daddy’s 9 p.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 WES & SHAWN This duo offers up acoustic harmonies.

Flicker Theatre & Bar 8:30 p.m. $5. www.myspace.com/ flickerbar AIMEE ARGOT Lead singer from the band Des Ark who recently recorded with J. Mascis. Her fuzzed-out songs are driven by lovelorn angst.

LITTLE GOLD This Brooklyn band describes itself as psychedelic country—somewhere between Wilco and My Morning Jacket.

MADELINE Bell-voiced local songwriter Madeline Adams plays endearing songs of smalltown loves, hopes and other assorted torments and joys.

Little Kings Shuffle Club 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/littlekingsshuffleclub BLUE ATLAS Nashville native and songwriter extraordinaire Amber Lynn, together with a new band, seeks to melt your heart.

Rye Bar 10 p.m. www.myspace.com/ryebarathens THE EPIC OPEN MIC NIGHT Athens Blur magazine and Rye Bar present a six-week open mic challenge. It’s like March Madness, only with more guitars and less basketballs.

Tasty World Uptown 10 p.m. FREE! www.myspace.com/ tastyworlduptown CLOAK AND DAGGER DATING SERVICE With melodies sewn throughout the hard-hitting rock, this Snellville six-piece offers male/ female vocals and a dark sonic mood punctuated by intricate guitar solos.

DIVIDED LIKE A SAINT’S Local envelope-pushing rock band.

ERIC FORD Local singer-songwriter you may have seen playing acoustic guitar downtown on the corner of College and Clayton.

GREEN GERRY Particularly dreamlike and subtly electronic local artist.

MY MILKY WAY ARMS Old school video game-style electronic music from Austin.

Tuesday 8 Alibi FREE! 706-549-1010 J TUNES KARAOKE DANCE PARTY Every Tuesday.

Buffalo’s Southwest Café 6–10 p.m. $5 (includes lessons). 706354-6655 DINE & DANCE NIGHT Beginners and advanced dance lessons every Tuesday from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. followed by open dance until 10 p.m.

Tonight features Tango.

Caledonia Lounge 9:30 p.m. $5 (21+), $7 (18+). www. caledonialounge.com FIRE ZUAVE The lead singer of this Athens-by-way-of-West-Palm-Beach trio is the cousin of Of Montreal’s Kevin Barnes, but he sings a scratchier pop that veers toward Americana. His voice can channel both Conor Oberst and Jeff Tweedy, and the bassist and drummer buoy his melodies with clean backing vocals.

RICHARD SHERFEY AND ALL GOD’S CHILDREN Fronted by local singer Richard Sherfey, All God’s Children includes members of the bands Hey, Revolution! and Modern Skirts. Sherfey trucks in some squarely American, impassioned pop-rock songs.

TRUCKSTOP COFFEE Southern rock with songs about “whiskey, women, heartache and interstate highways.” k continued on next page

Your ultimate USED gear experience!

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THE CALENDAR! Farm 255 10 p.m. FREE! www.farm255.com DAN NETTLES Celebrated local jazz musician known for his work fronting Kenosha Kid. Fat Daddy’s 10 p.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 KARAOKE Huge karaoke dance party hosted by Lynn every Tuesday.

The Melting Point 7 p.m. $3. www.meltingpointathens. com* THE DRIFTWOOD BAND Acclaimed flat-picking guitarist Jimmy Driftwood brings his band for a night of legendary bluegrass.

No Where Bar 11 p.m. $2. (706) 546-4742 THE SUEX EFFECT The trio plays psychedelicized funk-rock instrumentals, relying on spacey harmonies.

Tasty World Uptown 9 p.m. $5. 706-543-0797 AMERICAN NIGHT An evening of Americana hosted by Clay Leverett and The Gun Show.

Wild Wing Café 10 p.m. FREE! www.wildwingcafe.com KARAOKE Every Tuesday night at the downtown wing chain’s upstairs space.

WUOG 90.5FM 8 p.m. FREE! www.wuog.org “LIVE IN THE LOBBY” Dusty Lightswitch will perform on the radio station’s weekly program.

Wednesday 9 40 Watt Club 9 p.m. $5 (21+). $7 (18+). www.40watt. com LONA Lona is the flagship band for local songwriter, guitarist and drummer Clay Leverett (The Chasers, Now It’s Overhead, Bright Eyes).

The band sends out more than a little country and more than enough gutsy, mid-tempo rock.

THE REJECTS Alternative punk rock from New York fueled by distorted guitar riffs and rumbling bass.

STILL, SMALL VOICE & THE JOYFUL NOISE A revolving lineup of family and friends pounding out garage-rock spirituals.

WORKHORSES OF THE ENTERTAINMENT/ RECREATIONAL INDUSTRY Stripped-down, twangy country with a dash of rock and roll.

Caledonia Lounge 10 p.m. $5 (21+), $7 (18+). www.caledonialounge.com DUSTY LIGHTSWITCH Described as “one of the most exciting and satisfying live bands in town” by our own Gordon Lamb, this revolving cast of local eccentrics delivers rock and roll with epic possibilites.

SLOW CLAW Straightforward, unpretentious, very listenable indie rock from Ohio.

SPRING TIGERS Taking cues from bands like XTC and Blur, local band Spring Tigers offers up angular pop rock.

THE TENANT New indie-rock band from Florida featuring vocals from Brad Register (ex- Summerbirds in the Cellar).

Farm 255 10 p.m. FREE! www.farm255.com CRAIG LIESKE Local experimental music stalwart of Garbage Island and Ether Frolic (among other projects).

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Tuesday, Sep. 8 continued from p. 25

JACK ROSE Virginia guitarist and founding member of drone band Pelt plays a solo acoustic set.

JASON TRAHAN The guitarist for The Ginger Envelope, Madeline, and the Merlin Olsen Twins goes it solo with improv and lap steel pieces.

Fat Daddy’s 10 p.m.–1 a.m. FREE! 706-353-0241 OPEN MIC Every Wednesday featuring Avery Dylan.

Harry Bissett’s Bayou Grill 8 p.m. FREE! 706-552-1193 THE BIG DADDY’S Clarence Young (Rack of Spam, The Jesters) teams up with Bill Pappas, Kenny Head (The Georgia Satellites), Tim Pritchett and Chris Hillsman to turn out some good-time Southern rock tunes.

Locos Grill & Pub 6:30 p.m. FREE! 706-549-7700 KIP JONES AND JAY RING Many of Jones’ tunes split between the reflective acoustic territory of Harvest-era Neil Young and the country-infused rock of ‘80s-era Steve Earle. Playing tonight as a duo with Jay Ring.

The Melting Point 9 p.m. $10 (adv.), $13 (door). www. meltingpointathens.com* REEVES GABRELS & HIS IMAGINARY FRI3NDS Grammynominated guitarist/songwriter Reeves Gabrels is best known for his work with David Bowie. His songs with Imaginary Fri3nds have a strong glam vibe with lots of arena-ready power twisted by clever eccentricities.

The Office Lounge 9:30 p.m. FREE! 706-549-0840 KARAOKE Every Wednesday with Stan.

Tasty World Uptown 10 p.m. $5. www.myspace.com/tastyworlduptown THE BORDER LIONS Rock and roll trio that plays ‘70s-inspired songs, with styles ranging from beachy to bluesy.

CORTEZ GARZA Local singer/songwriter Cortez Garza used to front NC emo band Mason Curse, but has relocated to Athens and turned more acoustic. The result is a truly contemporary take on Americana.

JOSH LOWELL A gentlemanly singer-songwriter who frequents the stage with Kate Morrissey. * Advance Tickets Available

Down the Line 9/10 DJ Elton Cougar (283 Bar) 9/10 Michael Bellar/AS-IS Ensemble / Tea Leaf Green (40 Watt Club)* 9/10 Casper and the Cookies / Dish / Matt Butcher (Caledonia Lounge) 9/10 Jacob Morris / Thomas Television (Farm 255) 9/10 Kyshona Armstrong / Bros.

Marler / Lefty Hathaway (Flicker Theatre & Bar) 9/10 Quiet Hooves (New Earth Music Hall) 9/10 Futurebirds / Mr. Falcon / Muletide Perkins (Tasty World Uptown) 9/10 Kinky Waikiki / Squat (The Melting Point) 9/11 Dirt Drifters / Eric Church (40 Watt Club) 9/11 Redstone Ramblers (Broad Street Bar and Grill)

9/11 Elvis 9/11 Memorial Show (Buffalo’s Southwest Café) 9/11 The Heap / Holy Liars / Ramsay Midwood (Farm 255) 9/11 Bang-Utot (Go Bar) 9/11 Ben Smith and Jim Tanner (Harmony Grove Grille) 9/11 David Prince (Harry Bissett’s Bayou Grill) 9/11 Dusty Lightswitch / Rollin’ Home / Sailor Dawn (Little Kings Shuffle Club) 9/11 The Domino Effect (Square One Fish Co.) 9/11 Bearfoot Hookers (Tasty World Uptown) 9/11 Michael Logen / Sister Hazel (The Classic Center)* 9/12 Mahogany vs. the King (Little Kings Shuffle Club) 9/12 Kate Herzig / Will Hoge (40 Watt Club)* 9/12 Repent at Leisure / Mary Sigalis (Athens Farmers Market) 9/12 Black Skies / The Jack Burton / Pride Parade (Caledonia Lounge) 9/12 Erica Sunshine Lee (Elberton Arts Center)* 9/12 WILX (Farm 255) 9/12 Bubbly Mommy Gun / Great Architect / Mouser (Flicker Theatre & Bar) 9/12 Eddie and the Public Speakers (Tasty World Uptown) 9/13 Northern Soul Dance Party (Ben’s Bikes) 9/13 Buttermilk Revival (Buffalo’s Southwest Café) 9/13 Sunday Jazz Brunch (Square One Fish Co.) 9/14 The Epic Open Mic Night (Rye Bar) 9/14 Buzzard Mountain Boys / Lokshen Kugel / StereoFidelics (The Melting Point) 9/15 The Black Hollies / Benjy Ferre (Caledonia Lounge) 9/15 Carl Lindberg (Farm 255) 9/15 Tent City (No Where Bar) 9/15 American Night (Tasty World Uptown) 9/15 Smokey’s Farmland Band (The Melting Point)* 9/16 Open Mic (Fat Daddy’s) 9/16 Cross Canadian Ragweed (40 Watt Club)* 9/16 SeepeopleS (Caledonia Lounge) 9/16 Milligan (Harry Bissett’s Bayou Grill) 9/16 Rachel O’Neil (Locos Grill & Pub) 9/16 Tent City (Square One Fish Co.) 9/16 A.A.Bondy / Sean Bones (Tasty World Uptown) 9/16 Derek Trucks Band ‘ The (The Classic Center) 9/16 Hightide Blues (The Melting Point) 9/17 Lera Lynn (Farm 255) 9/17 Brad Downs and the Poor Bastard Souls / George McConnell (No Where Bar) 9/17 George McConnell (Rye Bar) 9/17 Bloodkin / Leon Russell (The Melting Point)* 9/18 The Automatics / The Leading Edge (Farm 255) 9/18 Animals That Will Kill Yer Ass / Besides Daniel / Efren (Rye Bar) 9/18 The Films / Golden / The Incredible Sandwich / The Interns / Mercury’s Landing / Ponderosa / Tent City (Tasty World Uptown) 9/18 The Border Lions (Terrapin Beer Co.) 9/18 Missing Cats (The Melting Point)* 9/18 Amante Da Prez (UGA Campus) 9/19 Maserati / Ruby Isle / Still Flyin’ / Venice Is Sinking / The Yes of Course / The Young Sinclairs (40 Watt Club) 9/19 Kate Morrissey / Sarah Pray (Little Kings Shuffle Club)

Saturday, September 5

Today the Moon, Tomorrow the Sun, Dead Rabbits, This Piano Plays Itself, Kalvinova Tasty World Uptown Historically, romantic relationships between bandmembers don’t tend to work out for the best, but the super-tight Today the Moon, Tomorrow the Sun bonds between the members of Atlanta’s Today the Moon, Tomorrow the Sun have fueled their creativity. The band consists of singer/keyboardist Lauren Gibson, her husband Cregg Gibson on guitar, her best friend and longtime musical collaborator Micah Silverman on bass, and longtime friend Jeremy Cole on drums.

The band feels like a family sometimes, and of course they occasionally butt heads, but Lauren says that give-and-take has actually played a positive role in their songwriting process. “Doing things you care about so passionately can create sparks,” she says, “but usually those kinds of things just become like glitter in our music instead of exploding the band and making everyone want to walk away from it.”

Those sparkling shards must be working because Today the Moon… has been gaining great momentum and is currently touring full-time with plans of launching its own record label. In a couple of weeks the band will take a break to record a brand-new EP featuring new tracks and a couple of high-energy dance remixes. Today the Moon… plays electronic music that’s grounded in rock, featuring Muse-like guitar riffs and Metricesque vocal melodies with synth flourishes. Lauren says that sometimes her band gets pigeon-holed because of the female vocals, and comparisons to bands like Sonic Youth and Ladytron are frequent but slightly off base when acts like The Cure, Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead have been far more influential. “People just don’t have a lot of room, it feels like, in their CD collections for more than a handful of female-fronted bands, which is really confounding to me,” she says. Nonetheless, the response to the group’s electric live show has been overwhelming positive, so there’s no doubt Athens will make some room in its concert calendar for this show. [Michelle Gilzenrat]

9/19 The Films / The Interns / Ponderosa (Tasty World Uptown) 9/20 Timmeya Telford (Buffalo’s Southwest Café) 9/20 Desolation Wilderness / Madeline (Farm 255) 9/21 Lera Lynn / Packway Handle Band (Ashford Manor)* 9/22 Birds of Avalon (Caledonia Lounge) 9/23 Guff / Romaneko / Tendaberry (40 Watt Club) 9/24 Baby’s Blue Swingset (Farm 255) 9/24 A Hawk and a Hacksaw / Damon & Naomi (The Melting Point) 9/25 Perpetual Groove (40 Watt Club)* 9/25 Harrison Hudson / The K-Macks / Andrew Nelson / Radiolucent (Caledonia Lounge) 9/25 The Blekers (Tasty World Uptown) 9/25 Mercury Veil / Jon Roniger (Terrapin Beer Co.) 9/25 Corey Smith (The Classic Center)* 9/25 The Jesters (The Melting Point)* 9/26 Perpetual Groove (40 Watt Club)* 9/26 Lera Lynn / Whisper Kiss (Athens Farmers Market) 9/26 Gift Horse / Gus D (Farm 255) 9/26 Entropy (New Earth Music Hall) 9/26 Tent City (Square One Fish Co.) 9/26 High Strung / Rachel O’Neal (Terrapin Beer Co.) 9/26 The Decemberists (The Classic Center)* 9/27 Eagle Twin / Sunn O))) (Seney-Stovall Chapel) 9/28 The Felice Brothers (40 Watt Club)* 9/28 Tom Goss (Little Kings Shuffle Club) 9/29 The Baseball Project / The Minus 5 / Steve Wynn IV (40 Watt Club)* 9/29 The North Georgia Bluegrass Band (The Melting Point)*

9/30 Colour Revolt (40 Watt Club) 9/30 Napoleon Solo (Locos Grill & Pub) 10/1 Randy Rogers Band (40 Watt Club)* 10/1 Punch Brothers (MadisonMorgan Cultural Center)* 10/2 State Radio (40 Watt Club)* 10/2 Rachael Cantu (Classic City Arts)* 10/2 A Darker Shade (Rye Bar) 10/2 B. B. King (The Classic Center)* 10/2 Rack of Spam (The Melting Point) 10/3 Dan Deacon / Nuclear Power Pants / Wavves (40 Watt Club)* 10/3 Athens Folk Society Band (Athens Farmers Market) 10/6 Lonesome Traveler (The Melting Point)* 10/7 Titus Andronicus (Caledonia Lounge) 10/9 Bassnectar / DJ Vadim (40 Watt Club)* 10/10 Circulatory System / Faust (40 Watt Club)* 10/10 Thayer Sarrano / Tin Cup Prophette (Athens Farmers Market) 10/13 Steel String Session (The Melting Point)* 10/14 Jamey Johnson (40 Watt Club)* 10/16 Drivin’ N’ Cryin’ (40 Watt Club)* 10/18 Will Rock 4 Food (Taylor Grady House) 10/20 Built to Spill / Disco Doom (40 Watt Club)* 10/20 Curley Maple (The Melting Point)* 10/23 Social Distorrion / The Strangers (40 Watt Club)* 10/24 Dead Confederate / Meat Puppets (40 Watt Club)* 10/24 Fiddle DW / Ryan Monahan (Athens Farmers Market) 10/24 Harp Unstrung (Terrapin Beer Co.) 10/27 The Black Heart Procession / The Mumlers (40 Watt Club)* 10/27 Buck & Nelson (The Melting Point)*

FREE SHOW!

FREE SHOW!

FREE SHOW!

FREE SHOW!

10/28 Junior Boys (40 Watt Club)* 10/31 Faith and Paige Carmichael / William Tonks and Friends (Athens Farmers Market) 11/2 The Vic Chesnutt Band (40 Watt Club)* 11/3 The Drovers Old Time Medicine Show (The Melting Point) 11/7 Artie Ball Swing Band / Repent at Leisure (Athens Farmers Market) 11/14 Carl Lindberg and Friends / Grogus! (Athens Farmers Market) 11/14 Rachel O’Neal (Terrapin Beer Co.) 11/18 Cedric Burnside and Lightnin’ Malcolm / The Dirty Streets / Lucero (40 Watt Club)* 12/3 Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Holiday Concert (MadisonMorgan Cultural Center)* * Advance Tickets Available

In the ATL 9/3 Lee “Scratch” Perry (Variety Playhouse)* 9/6 Fruit Bats / Death Vessel / Night Driving in Small Towns (The EARL)* 9/7 The Brunettes / Throw Me the Statue (Drunken Unicorn)* 9/9 Chairlift / Micachu (Drunken Unicorn)* 9/14 …And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead (The Masquerade)* 9/21 The Horrors (The EARL)* 9/30 Phoenix (Variety Playhouse) 10/4 Metallica (Philips Arena)* 10/5 Grizzly Bear / Beach House (Variety Playhouse)* 10/9 Phosphorescent (The EARL)* 10/16 Os Mutantes (Variety Playhouse)* 10/16 Hope Sandoval (The Loft)* * Advance Tickets Available

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bulletin board DO SOMETHING; GET INVOLVED! LABOR Day Deadline: The deadline for getting listed in Bulletin Board will be Tuesday, Sept. 1 at 5 p.m.

Email calendar@flagpole.com. Listings are printed based on available space, more listings are online.

ART Art Classes (Blue Tin Art Studio) Now registering! Classes include drawing, painting, encaustic, comics, book making, jewelry and digital photography. Classes begin Sept.

19. 404-556-6884, www.bluetin studio.com Call for Artists (Lyndon House Arts Center) Market spaces available at Gypsy Artist Market, an open air market featuring eclectic wares by artists of all ages. $15–$30. Register

by Sept. 10. undergroundathens2@ yahoo.com or visit Gypsy Market on Facebook.

Call for Artists (Downtown Washington) The Washington Wilkes Arts Foundation seeks submissions for ArtFest, taking place Nov. 7 & 8. www.washingtonwilkesarts.org Call for Entries (ATHICA) Seeking strong, focused proposals from curators, teams or potential featured artists who have missionappropriate installations or cohesive bodies of work for slots in late 2010 and 2011. Deadline Sept. 30. www. athica.org/callforentries.php

AUDITIONS Dancefx Concert Dance Company (Dancefx) Auditioning talented, experienced and passionate male and female jazz and contemporary dancers ages 18 & up.

Sept. 4–5, 5 p.m. www.dancefx.org, 706-355-3078 FX2 and FX3 Dance Company (Dancefx) Auditioning middle school

and high school dancers for 20092010 performance companies. Sept.

3, 4:30 p.m. www.dancefx.org, 706355-3078

CLASSES Acting for Film Workshop (106 West Performing Arts Venue, Winder) Next five-week session of this ongoing workshop begins Sept.

8, but you can come anytime (no charge for the first class). Consistent class attendees will have the opportunity to work on a short film. Open to ages 16 & up. No acting experience necessary. Tuesdays, 6:45 p.m. $95 (adults), $65 (students). 770868-1977, beckytollerson@106west. com Adopt-a-Stream Workshops (Sandy Creek Nature Center) Learn how to assess the water quality of our streams. For ages 13 and up.

Sept. 12 & 26, 9 a.m.–1 p.m. FREE! Pre-register at 706-613-3615.

African-American Genealogical Research (ACC Library) The Clarke-Oconee Genealogical Society explores African-American family history research experiences and methodology. Sept. 26, 1 p.m. FREE! 706613-3650, loutome@aol.com Art Classes (Lyndon House Arts Center) Registration now open for fall classes. List of programs and descriptions online. 706-613-3623, www.accleisureservices.com Basket Weaving (State Botanical Garden of Georgia) Learn how to construct simple cane baskets for your fall flower arrangements.

ART AROUND TOWN 160 Tracey Street (Unit 4 in Chase Street Warehouses) Paintings by Andy Cherewick.

ACC Library (Top of the Stairs Gallery) Paintings by Tyler Harris. Through September.

Antiques and Jewels “Athens Fine Art Gallery,” an exhibit featuring works by Mary Porter, Elizabeth Barton, Brandon Zinninger, Greg Benson, Jim StipeMaas, Taylor DuBeau, Judy Dudley O’Donnell and Susan Elizabeth. Through September.

Aurum Studio New charcoal work on paper by Mark Watkins and arcrylic paintings by Amy Wilmoth Watts. Though September.

Big City Bread Cafe Acrylic and watercolor paintings by Lauren Harrell. Through September.

Black Forest Bakery & Deli New floral paintings by Marshall L. Reddoch. Through Sept. 20.

Ciné Barcafé “A Handful of Dust,” featuring paintings and drawings by Adrian Cox and Lizzy Hinrich, explores the relationship between time, death and memory through the sublime landscape. Through Sept. 18. Reception Sept. 18.

Downtown Watkinsville Artscape 2009, an outdoor display of art boards created by 10 local artists that is sponsored by the City of Watkinsville and Grassroots Arts Program. Through Sept. 30.

Espresso Royale Caffe Work by Ainhoa B. Canup.

Five Star Day Café Paintings of Athens by Heidi Hensley. Through September.

Flicker Theatre & Bar Photography by Holly Brown. Through Sept. 3.

Good Dirt Work by Jeff Bishoff and Juana Gnecco.

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Cost of class includes materials.

Pre-registration required. Sept. 8, 6:30–8:30 p.m. $27. www.uga.edu/ botgarden Bellydance for Fitness (Floorspace) Women of all sizes and experience welcome. Wednesdays, 7:30 p.m. $60/6 weeks, $12/class. floorspaceathens.com Bellydancing Class (Five Points Yoga) Two-hour introductory workshop. No experience required.

Sept. 5, 1:30–3:30 p.m. $20. www. athensfivepointsyoga.com Clay Classes (Good Dirt) Weekly "Try Clay" class every Friday from 7–9 p.m. and "Family Try Clay" every Sunday from 2–4 p.m. ($20/ person). 706-355-3161, www.good dirt.net Clay, Glass Fusing, and Knitting Classes (Good Dirt) Now accepting registration for fall classes. All levels of experience welcome.

Computer Class (ACC Library) Introduction to Excel. In the Educational Technology Center. Call to register. Sept. 24, 10–11:30 a.m.

FREE! 706-613-3650 Dance Classes (Floorspace) Now registering for beginning and intermediate modern dance classes.

706-540-1039, www.floorspace athens.com Fall Container Planting (State Botanical Garden of Georgia) Landscape architect Connie Cottingham discusses the principles of design and shares tips on potting mixers, choosing a container, spring bulbs and plant choices for sun or shade. Nov. 10, 5:30–7 p.m. $17. www.uga.edu/botgarden

Through mid-September.

The Grit Photography by Robyn Waserman. Through Sept. 13.

Just Pho…and More Work by Stephen Humphreys. Through Sept. 15.

Lamar Dodd School of Art “Divergent Impressions,” the 2009 Printmaking Invitational, features the work of Sarah Bryant, Leslie Mutchler, Matthew Sugarman and Jason Urban. Reception Sept.

4. “Physical/Metaphysical” featuring work by Rocio Rodriguez, Don Cooper and Betsy Cain. Through Sept. 15.

Lyndon House Arts Center “Lord Love You: Works by R.A. Miller from the Mullis Collection” includes more than 75 paintings, drawings, sculptures and whirligigs created by the Georgia self-taught artist Reuben Aaron Miller. Through Oct. 24. “Surrealist Tropical Pop,” features paintings by artists Stanley Bermudez and Carlos Solis. Reception Aug. 29.

O.K. Coffee New paintings by Amanda Trader and Liz Williams. Through Sept. 5.

Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation 7th Annual Perspectives Pottery Exhibition features the work of over 50 Georgian potters. Aug. 29–Sept. 16.

Reception Aug. 28.

State Botanical Garden of Georgia “The Wonders of Nature,” an exhibit featuring silk painting, watercolor, oil painting, sculpture, photography and more. Aug. 30–Sep. 20. Reception Aug. 30.

Transmetropolitan Photographs by Kathryn Bowen.

Walk the Line Tattoo Co. “Don’t Tell Mommy,” an annual erotic art show, features work by Joe Havasy, Nash Hogan, Keith Rein, Lea Purvis and other local artists. Through September.

Todd Diederich’s photograph “Watson Mill Bridge, GA” is on exhibit at White Tiger Gourmet, Sept. 4–30.

Garden Earth Naturalist Program (State Botanical Garden of Georgia) Hands-on program for homeschoolers. Topics include pollination, air and water purification, pest control, soil production and recycling. Nov. 23–Dec. 11, 9–11 a.m. (ages 6–8), 1–3 p.m. (ages 9–11). $22–$36. 706-542-6156 Gentle Yoga (St. Gregory's Episcopal Church) Bring your own mat or towel and wear loose clothing. Julie Horne, instructor.

Tuesdays, 5:30–7 p.m. $9/class.

706-354-1996 Intro to Computers (Madison County Library) Alisa Claytor, computer specialist, offers an Introduction to Computers series.

Three weekly meetings, and you may attend one per week or all three. Preregistration required. 706-795-5597.

Tuesdays, 2–3 p.m. or 7–8 p.m.

Wednesdays, 11 a.m.–12 p.m.

Knitting Classes (Good Dirt) 8-week knitting class starting Sept.

14. Weeks 1–3: Beginner Level: Beginning Stitches. Weeks 4–8: Intermediate Level: Reading a Pattern. Mondays, 7–9 p.m. 706355-3161, www.gooddirt.net Mama-Baby Yoga (Five Points Yoga) For babies 1–8 months old and their grown-ups. Every Monday.

11 a.m. $10. 706-355-3114, www. athensfivepointsyoga.com Online Job Application Tips (ACC Library) Learn tips and strategies for filling out job applications on the web. Sept. 24, 12:15 p.m.

FREE! 706-613-3650 Open Art Studio (Art School, Watkinsville) Led by Tracy Jefferies.

Participants work at their own pace, and instruction is provided as requested. Reduced fee if you bring your own supplies. Open to all experience levels. Mondays, 12:30–2:30

p.m. $190 for 8 classes (includes supplies). artschoolstreet@gmail. com, www.artschoolwatkinsville.com Open Hoops (Canopy Studio) No instruction. Bring your own hoop.

Every Friday, 6–7 p.m. $5. 706-5498504, info@canopystudio.com Pottery Workshop (Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation) Construction and glazing techniques taught by Katie McDougal and Jennifer Grall. Part of Perspectives GA Pottery Invitational. Sept. 5–6, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. $65/day or $125/ both. 706-769-4565, www.ocaf.com Prenatal Yoga (Five Points Yoga) Get ready for birth and beyond with Jenni Derryberry Mann, RYT-200.

Every Sunday. 10:30 a.m. $10. 706355-3114, www.athensfivepoints yoga.com Prenatal Yoga (Full Bloom Center) Get ready for birth and beyond. Every Thursday. 5:30 p.m.

SOPHIE

$14/class or $60/6 classes. 706353-3373, www.fullbloomparent. com Qigong (State Botanical Garden of Georgia, Visitor Center, Great Room) Certified Qigong instructor Carl Lindberg leads class on the ancient Chinese art of self-cultivation that fosters health, relaxation and calm.

Mondays, Sept. 14–Oct. 5, 12–1 p.m. $50. 706-542-6156, www.uga. edu/botgarden Registration for Learning in Retirement Classes (Trumps on Milledge) Register for one of over 30 classes. Classes include "Operating a Computer," "Economic and Financial Changes" and "The Creek Indian Nation." Sept.

14, 9:30–11:30 a.m. 706-549-7350, athenslir.org Reiki Clinic (Pangea Herb Shop) De-stress with a 15-minute reiki tune-up. Sept. 12, 1–5 p.m. FREE! 706-549-6007 Tae Kwon Do & Jodo Classes (Live Oak Martial Arts) For kids and adults, beginner through advanced.

Chase St. Warehouses, next to Canopy and ATHICA. Mondays– Thursdays, 3:30-8:30 p.m. 706-5480077, www.liveoakmartialarts.com Tai Chi in the Park on Talmadge Drive (Mind Body Institute, Athens Regional Medical Center) Offering Tai Chi instruction.

Reserve a spot. Saturdays, 9:30– 10:30 a.m. FREE! 706-475-7329, mbiprograms@armc.org Take One: A Fundamental Look at Screenwriting (Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation) An intro to screenwriting taught by veteran writer Terry Kay, a regional Emmy winner for his teleplay Run Down the Rabbit. Sept. 26 & 27. $150. 706-769-4565, www.ocaf.com Tech Tips: YouTube (ACC Library) Learn your way around today's most popular video-sharing website. Sept. 30, 12:15 p.m. FREE! 706-613-3650 Watercolor Classes (The Loft) New six-week session with instructor Jackie Slayton Methe begins Sept. 10. Thursdays, 10 a.m.–12 p.m. $80/6-week session. 706-5485334, theloftartstore@aol.com Yoga and Tai Chi Classes (Athens Wellness Cooperative) For beginners through experienced. See full calendar online. $14/drop-in, $60/6 classes, $108/12 classes. www.wellnesscooperative.com Yoga Classes (Om Town Yoga, 190 Park Avenue) Multi-class discounts. Mondays, 6:15 p.m.

Wednesdays, 5:45 p.m. $10/drop-in. www.athensomtownyoga.com Yoga Crawlers (Full Bloom Center) For active babies 8–18 months. Every Tuesday. 10:30 a.m. $14. 706-353-3373, www.fullbloom parent.com Yoshukai Karate (AKF Itto Martial Arts) Learn Yoshukai Karate, a traditional hard Okinawan style. www. akfitto.com Zumba at the Garden (State Botanical Garden of Georgia) Latin rhythms and easy-to-follow moves comprise this dynamic fitness program. Wednesdays, Sept. 9–Oct. 28, 5:30–6:30 p.m. $10/class, $48/session. www.uga.edu/botgarden

HELP OUT! American Red Cross (Red Cross Center, 3525 Atlanta Hwy.) Seeking donors for all blood types. 706-5460681, www.redcrossblood.org Athens Farmers' Market Volunteers (Bishop Park) Looking for people willing to help out anytime between 6:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. on any Saturday through Nov. 14. Volunteers get vegetable

donations from the farmers. market manager@athensfarmersmarket.net AthFest Volunteer Opportunity (Email for Location) The AthFest Education Committee seeks year-round volunteers to assist them in their mission to connect local music to local schools. education@athfest.com Community Blood Drive (Oconee State Bank, 7920 Macon Highway) Save a life; donate blood.

Sept. 23, 8:30 a.m.–1:30 p.m. 706769-6611 Tailgate Raffle (Athens YMCA) Tailgate4kids is looking for organizations to help with sponsorship and ticket sales in a raffle to send kids to summer camp. 706-613-9098, tailgate4kids@gmail.com.

Teach English as a Second Language (Various Locations) Catholic Charities seeks volunteers to teach adult English classes in the evenings. Ongoing training available. 706-254-1371, vpflug@ archatl.com

KIDSTUFF Art Classes (Art School) Eightweek classes for kids and teens begin Sept. 21. Register by Sept. 16. $130 for 8 classes (includes supplies). artschoolstreet@gmail.com, www.artschoolwatkinsville.com Creative Movement (Floorspace) Ongoing class for ages 3–5.

Tuesdays, 10 a.m. Wednesdays, 1 p.m. 706-850-5557, www.floorspace athens.com Insectival! (State Botanical Garden of Georgia) Family festival with discovery stations, roach and beetle races, puppet show and lots of live insects. Butterfly release at 11 a.m.

Sept. 19, 9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m. $3/ person, $10 (family max), FREE! ages 2 & under. 706-542-6156 Sweet Pea Club (State Botanical Garden of Georgia) Program involves puppet shows, storytelling, learning games, nature crafts and garden explorations. Ages 3–5. Preregistration required. Fridays, Oct. 16–Nov. 6, 9–11 a.m.$14. www.uga. edu/botgarden Yoga Sprouts (Memorial Park) Now registering. Learn fun, playful yoga poses and breathing exercises.

Session II: Oct. 20–Dec. 8. Ages 3–6 & 7–12. Tuesdays. $0–$48 (scholarships available). 706-6133580, yogasprouts@gmail.com

ON THE STREET 4e Dungeons & Dragons Game New weekly D&D game in Athens looking for players. All levels of experience welcome. athensDnD @hotmail.com Kill-a-Watt Devices Available (ACC Library) Check out an energy detector toolkit and measure your energy consumption!

FREE! 706-613-3650, www.gefa.org New Graphic Novel Collection (ACC Library) Collection includes works by Neil Gaiman, Will Eisner, Harvey Pekar and more. 706-613-3650 Showtime Series (The UGA Performing Arts Center) This year's lineup includes the Hot 8 Brass Band, Mariachi Los Camperos de Nati Cano and the Moscow Festival Ballet. Tickets on sale now. 706542-4400, www.uga.edu/pac Tickets on Sale (The Classic Center) Season tickets to The Classic Center's music and event series are available now. The Derek Trucks Band, B.B. King, Corey Smith, Bela Fleck & the Flecktones and more. 706-357-4444, www. classiccenter.com f

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

29

comics

Comics submissions: Please email your comics to comics@flagpole.com or mail copies, not originals, to Flagpole Comics Dept., P.O. Box 1027, Athens, GA 30603. You can hand deliver copies to our office at 112 S. Foundry Street.

Comics POLICY: Please do not give us original artwork. If we need your original, we will contact you. If you give us your original artwork, we are not responsible for its safety. We retain the right to run any comics we like. Thank you, kindly.

30

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

reality check

From what you have said, I don’t think he wants to get back together with you. It

sounds like he just needs to talk to somebody that understands what he is going through.

And if you want to be that person then go right ahead, but it’s obviously killing you, and if you ask me, it isn’t your job anymore. You may have gone into this blind, but you know now that you are just going to end up hurt.

You’re still not over him; you are jealous of a random name in his cell phone, and you are making yourself crazy.

What you should do is tell him that you wish you were able to be there for him but that you have realized that it is just too hard. But I know damn well that what you are likely to do is keep doing this to yourself in the hope that he has somehow changed his mind, all the while telling yourself (and everyone around you) that everything is fine and that you are just being a friend and that you have no expectations. Eventually this will lead to some kind of meltdown, after which you will likely never be able to talk to him again.

Consider the former. It’s much easier.

I’ve just given notice at a job I have had for several years. There is a guy there that I have always had a crush on, but because we worked together I was afraid to say anything or do anything about it. I feel like there might be some mutual interest, because he has definitely flirted with me before, but I don’t know if it’s worth bringing up now that I am leaving. I got another job and I am moving out of state.

Should I just leave it alone and keep it as a fantasy/what-could-have-been situation?

Or should I confess to him and see what he says? Part of me thinks that I should just leave it, but there is a part of me that wants to know if he was ever interested or if it was all in my head. I am not the only one who has noticed him. A lot of us girls at work have talked about how cute he is.

I think he is single now, but I am not sure. I guess it would be dumb to try and start something when I’m leaving in a month, right?

Office Romantic

LOWE’S

I’m confused. My ex has been calling me a lot recently, and I don’t know how to feel about it. We have been broken up for six months or so. Before that, we had been together more or less for two years. There were fights and breaks and time-outs in there, but mostly we were a couple. When we broke up it was mostly him. I was too serious, he wasn’t ready, we were too young, etc. I was devastated. He was the best boyfriend I had ever had, and I was never as close to anyone as I was to him.

A lot of bad stuff happened in my life while we were together, and I think that was part of the problem. Like, it was hard for me to be “fun” when people (friends and family) kept dying. I think it wore him out. And I know he didn’t understand, and couldn’t understand, because he had never lost anyone close to him.

Well, now he has. And he is devastated. And he has been calling me a lot, “just to talk.”

I have taken his calls, no matter what time of day or night, and I have offered sympathy and distraction and whatever else I thought he needed or wanted. And, finally, we decided to meet up and go out. He lives an hour or so away, so I went to visit him. We went out and had fun, saw a movie, talked for hours, and we were very comfortable. It felt good, but then feeling good made me feel weird. At one point, when he was checking his phone, I saw my number and noticed that he had changed my name in it. Ouch. I am now a first name and a last initial.

No longer “The” but now “A”, and it stings a little. Also, I noticed another girl’s name in there repeatedly and it was new to me. I really wish I could say it didn’t bother me, but it does. I wasn’t looking through his phone, though, he was scrolling through his call log. I wasn’t spying, I swear. Anyway, now I feel weird and confused.

I don’t know what he wants from me, if anything, but old feelings are starting to bubble up and I don’t know what to do.

Should I tell him? Do you think there is hope for us?

Is he trying to get back together with me? I don’t want to go through this again, but I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss him. Plus I think maybe now that he has had this experience, he might understand why I was the way I was while we were together. Like, maybe now that he has experienced some of what I was going through back then, maybe he has some regrets about how it ended. I don’t know. I am confused. We’re supposed to hang out again next weekend, and I don’t know what to expect or how to act. And I would appreciate any advice you can give me. This is torture.

FAT DADDY’S Gaines School Rd.

Lexington Rd.

Matters Of The Heart And Loins

what ha on THE EASpTpSens E stays on thID e eastside

IS DOWNTOWNTH E O T G MOVIN EASTSIDE

4030 Lexington Rd.

new hours mon-sat 11am-2am

706-353-0241 new!

coors light, coors original & blue moon

Tuesday, SEPTEMBER 1

KARAOKE WITH LYNN BEST IN TOWN 9pm

now on draft!

BEST food IN TOWN!

wednesday, SEPTEMBER 2

OPEN MIC NIGHT! AVERY DYLAN

lunch • dinner • late night including

FEATURING

thursday, SEPTEMBER 3

KARAOKE WITH LYNN BEST IN TOWN 9pm POOL TOURNAMENT friday, SEPTEMBER 4

COMMON PEOPLE BAND

9pm

SATUrday, SEPTEMBER 5

UGA vs. OKLAHoMA ST. ON 7 FLATSCREENS • 3:30pm AFTER THE GAME

the best & biggest chicken wings 1/4lb. nathan’s famous hotdogs MOZZARELLA STICKS AND SO MUCH MORE!

WATCH

BIG DANCE PARTY with lynn MONday, SEPTEMBER 7

WES & SHAWN 9pm TEXAS HOLD ‘EM 6pm & 9pm

ACOUSTIC SOUNDS OF

UGA LUNCH SPECIALS with valid ID

It would be dumb to try and start something, OR, but there’s no reason why you can’t confess in the hope of a couple of weeks of hot-and-heavy, no-strings-attached sex, right? I mean, if you’re into that sort of thing.

Then you would really be able to carry the fantasy around. Unless you think it might be bad, in which case maybe you should leave it.

But think of the other girls in the office. You could sort of take one for the team and then give them something to talk about, right? I don’t know. Seems like it might be fun, if you ask me.

Jyl Inov Got a question for Jyl? Submit your anonymous inquiry via the Reality Check button at www.flagpole.com.

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

31

Real Estate Apartments for Rent 2BR/2.5BA condo. Along river. Avail. now. HWflrs., W/D, DW, ceiling fans, deck, amenities galore, convenient to everything. $650/mo. Call Matt at (706) 248-9088.

2BR/1BA in Stadium Village.

Very private, gated w/ pool, fitness, walk to UGA. $650/mo.

(706) 206-2347.

2 bedrooms, 1 bath.

Fireplace, dishwasher.

Cedar Shoals Rd. Eastside. Rent $525/mo., $525/dep. Call (706) 7698781.

3BR/2.5BA Eastside townhome.

Spacious & convenient, on bus route. Pets allowed. Incl.

W/D. Only $700/mo. Call Aaron (706) 207-2957. $685/mo. 2BR/2.5BA. 1 mi. from Dwntn. 139 Berlin Ct. Pet friendly! Spacious kitchen, balcony, DW, W/D, CHAC, free trash p/u. On busline.

Renovated exterior. No dep., no pet fee! Avail. Oct. (maybe earlier). Call Mark (615) 3086275.

Best deal in town! El Dorado 2BR/1BA & studio apts. in Nor maltown. Free water, gas, basic cable & wireless Internet. W/D in 2BR units.

Dog runs. $420–$675/mo.

Joiner & Associates (706) 5497371.

1BR apt. for $475/mo. 2BR apt. starting at $700/mo.

3BR apt starting at $1000/ mo. All close to campus!

Howard Properties (706) 5460300.

1BR/1BA. All electric, water furnished, nice! On bus line.

Single pref. Avail. now! (706) 543-4271.

1BR/1BA + study/guest rm.

Security gates, pool, fitness center, 1 mi. from campus.

Excellent condition. Reduced $600/mo. Pets OK. Call Rob (706) 338-4984 or email robwimberly@gmail.com.

1BRs starting at $467.50/mo., 2BRs starting at $506.67/mo., 3BRs starting at $705/mo.

Sec. dep. starts at $150. On busline, pet friendly! Walk–in closets, FPs, recycling avail. on site. Call today! (706) 5496254. Restrictions apply.

2BR/1.5BA East Athens Duplex for rent. Fresh paint, W/D, DW, range, fridge, trash & yard service incl. Pets OK. Avail. now! $550/mo. Toll free (877) 740-1514.

205 Little Street. 2BR/1BA. Water, gas, power incl. Near Dwntn. $550/mo. Call Joiner Management (706) 353-6868.

2BR duplexes starting at $450/ mo. (706) 549-6070.

Basement apt. 5 Pts/ Glenwood. Kitchen, BA, lg. entry hall, carpeted BR/sitting rm. w/ lg. closet. No pets. NS. $450/mo. & deposit. Utils incl.

(706) 543-8821.

A Nice 2BR/2BA in great n’hood (ARMC area). Centrally located, convenient to everything. Walking n’hood.

HWflrs., lots of light, big front yd. W/D. $700/mo + sec. dep. 1 yr. lease. Small pet negotiable w/ pet dep. N/S. 132 Sunset Terrace. Call (706) 850-5530.

Cedar Shoals Dr. 5BR/4BA. Lg. rms, W/D incl., quiet n’hood. $1000/mo. + dep.

(706) 742-8555.

Early deadline for Classified Ad placement!

We will be closed on Sept. 7th for the Labor Day Holiday. All Classified ad placements or changes must be submitted before 11am on Friday 9/4.

Move–in special. Westside 2BR/2BA, $475/mo. Eastside 2BR/1BA, $475/mo. (706) 2550385.

White Columns Hall.

1BR/1BA, 1 block from Dwntn.

Water, gas, incl., laundry onsite. $465/mo. Call Joiner Management (706) 353-6868.

Westside condos.

2BR/2BA, $600/mo.

3BR/2BA, $700/mo.

Converted clubhouse into a huge open flr. plan.

4BR/2.5BA, $1200/mo. 5 Pts. 2BR/2.5BA. lv. rm w/ FP. Corner lot. $700/mo. Eastside quadraplex 2BR/2BA, $525/mo. 2BR/1BA, $490/mo.

Call McWaters Realty, (706) 549-3222, (706) 353-2700 or cell (706) 540-1529.

Apartments for Sale FSBO. 1BR studio condo.

Broad St., Athens. HWflrs, appls incl. Private & secure. $94,900. (706) 474-1101.

Condo. 2BR/2BA. Near campus/busline. Community pool, low assoc. fees. W/D, FP, HVAC, ceiling fans, private patio, new paint, move–in ready. $96K. (706) 546-0290, (706) 296-3313.

3BRs. 180 O’Farrell, Check out these great houses in the heart of 5 Pts. Online at boulevard proper tymanagement. com or call (706) 5489797.

Commercial Property

3BR/2BA house. Cedar creek subdivision. Fenced backyd., gas grill attached to sundeck, FP, wooded lot. Quiet family n’hood. Swimming community.

360 Sandstone Dr. Avail. 7/1. $1025/mo. + dep. (706) 3191846 or (706) 548-4819. GA. R, E, lic. 300830.

Athens Executive Suites.

Offices avail. in historic Dwntn bldg. w/ on–site parking. All utils., Internet, & janitorial incl.

Single or multiple offices avail.

Call Stacy (706) 425-4048 or (706) 296-1863.

Retail Suites for lease at Homewood Village.

1K–12,500 sq. ft. avail. For more info call Bryan Austin at (706) 353-1039 or visit www. sumnerproperties.net.

Amazing Office Spaces for lease above Dwntn Five Guys restaurant. No better location! Call Reign at Coldwell Banker Upchurch Realty (706) 372-4166, or (706) 543-4000.

Eastside offices for lease.

1060 Gaines School Rd. 170 sq. ft., $375/mo., 500 sq. ft., $625/mo., 1200 sq. ft., $1200/mo. (706) 546-1615 or athenstownproperties.com.

Paint Artist Studio for rent. 300 sq. ft., $150/mo.

400 sq. ft., $200/mo. 160 Tracy St. Historic Boulevard Area, Artist/Crafts Community.

(706) 546-1615 or www. athenstownproperties.com.

Westside office space for lease. Call owner for info. at (706) 552-0450 or (706) 2065105.

Houses for Rent $1050/mo. 3BR/2BA house in country. 9 mi. from Dwntn.

W/D hookup, DW, FP. Call (706) 540-8461.

3BR/1BA attractive brick house in quiet residential n’hood. Nice condition. CHAC, DW, W/D, & carport. $750/mo.

Call (706) 548-5869.

Duplex for rent. 2BR/1.5BA. Jolly Lane in Sleepy Hollow Subdivision. Near UGA, Memorial Park & Birchmore Trail. W/D, DW, CHAC, FP. $675/mo. Call April (706) 549-5006, go to www. athenscondosales.com.

3BR/2BA. HWflrs., CHAC, DW, W/D, bonus room, fenced yd.

Pet friendly. Close to Dwntn & Riverwalk. $780/mo. Flexible lease. (646) 247-5646.

3BR/3BA like new! Close to campus, perfect for students!

1 mi. from Dwntn Athens. Pets OK. Bridgewater Subdivision. $1200/mo. Call Barbara (770) 237-9148.

Affordable housing.

Houses, condos, A-frame all $550/mo. or less. Various locations. Excellent cond.

Cats permitted w/ dep. Call (706) 202-0147, (706) 5496070.

Athens & near Campus!

597 Dearing St.off Milledge.

4BR/2BA, $1495/mo. 105 Whitehall Rd., 2BR/1BA, $675/mo.All w/ HWflrs., no carpet. (706) 546-7946, Flowersnancy@bellsouth.net.

See virtual tours www. nancyflowers.com. $800/mo. 4BR cool houses.

Wa l k t o U G A & t o w n .

Renovated, lg. farmhouse.

Also avail. newer 2–story, 4.5BA, $900/mo. Charming character. CHAC, W/D, DW. Avail. now. (706) 215-4496.

$600/mo., $500/dep.

3BR/1.5BA A–frame cottage.

180 Nowhere Rd. Athens.

(770) 715-6168. Pets w/ extra dep. W/D, refrigerator. $750/mo. Blocks to Campus.

4BR/2BA. Tall ceilings, central air, DW, W/D conn., sunroom, pets allowed. 231 Elizabeth St. Owner/Agent. Call Mike (706) 207-7400.

145 Mell St. 3BR/3BA, 5 Pts., 2 blocks to UGA, $500/BR. Free utilities.

CHAC, W/D, DW, wood flrs. hathawayproperties@gmail. com, (706) 714-4486.

143 Ruth St. 3BR/1BA. Close to UGA/Dwntn/Greenway. Just completely redone. HVAC, W/D, all electric. Pets OK. Fenced yd. Avail. now. $800/ mo. + dep. (706) 338-7257.

1BR studio house off Barber St. $475/mo. (706) 353-3555.

1BR/1BA studio condo. Broad St. & UGA. HWflrs, appls incl.

Private & secure. $600/mo.

(706) 474-1101.

149 Eaglewood Way. 5 Pts. 4BR/2.5BA end–unit condo o n b u s l i n e . H VA C , D W, W/D, decks, pool. Awesome location, great deal! $1K/ mo. + dep. Avail. now. Jimmy (706) 338-7257.

2BR/1BA, 151 Marlin St. off North Ave. Split level duplex.

4 blocks from Dwntn, recently renovated. New kitchen, W/D, bamboo flrs., CHAC, fenced yd. $675/mo. Dave (706) 2019222.

3BR/2.5BA Lexington Estates, Eastside. 6 mi. to UGA. WD, DW, CHAC. 2–car garage & extra pad. Open plan. Master BA w/ dual vanities & sep. shower. Lg. closets, porch & deck. Lg. lot.

Low utils. Quiet. $1000/mo., w/ dep. & ref. Call (404) 4024921.

3BR/3BA, 145 Mell St. 5 Pts. 2 blocks to UGA, $500/BR. Free utilities.

CHAC, W/D, DW, wood flrs. hathawayproperties@gmail. com, (706) 714-4486.

3BR/2BA w/ basement.

Fenced backyd., carport.

All electric. W/D. 1 mi. from Dwntn. $900/mo. 145 Conrad Dr. Call Brian (706) 613-7242.

Available Now and Pre-Leasing for Fall 1-Year-Old

TOWNHOUSE EASTSIDE

3BR / 3BA • Basement/Garage $950

Hamilton & Associates

706-613-9001 · 706-613-1776 (fax)

www.athens-ga-rental.com

32

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

CLASSIFIED AD CUSTOMERS, PLEASE NOTE: DUE TO LABOR DAY HOLIDAY, THERE IS AN

EARLY DEADLINE FOR SEPT 9 ISSUE SUBMIT ALL ADS BY FRIDAY, SEPT 4 AT 11:00 A.M.!

3BR/2BA historic home near Dwntn, off Pulaski. Brand new renovations, energy efficient w/ lg. rooms & HWflrs., laundry.

Very clean/nice. $900/mo.

Avail. now. (706) 614-3557.

3 B R / 2 B A . 1 b l o c k f ro m Milledge. HVAC, HWflrs., tile BAs, fenced yd. Move–in ready. $900/mo. + dep. Call Mark (706) 202-5110.

3BR/2BA renovated Victorian. Price reduced.

1/2 mi. to UGA. Lg. rms., high ceilings. HWflrs, front porch back deck. Nice yd. lots of parking. W/D, DW, CHAC. Pets OK. $1000/mo. (706) 369-2908.

3BR/1.5BA attractive brick house CHAC, DW, W/D hookup, carport, yd. service incl. $650/ mo. Call (706) 548-5869.

3BR/1.5BA. 288 4th St. Pre– leasing for 8/1. Fenced yd, DW, CHAC, W/D, basement, tile flrs. (706) 254-2936.

3BR/2BA house w/ fireplace & fenced yd. In a nice subdivision in West Athens.

Call (706) 549-7371. Joiner & Associates Realtors.

3BR/2BA. 525 McWhorter, Five Points. HWflrs., tile BAs, FP, eat–in kitchen, study, master BR/BA w/ jacuzzi, bonus space/playroom.

Barrow elementary. Call (706) 548-9797, boulevard proper tymanagement. com.

3BR/2BA renovated home 1 street mi. from Dwntn in Chicopee–Dudley. $ 7 2 5 / mo. Big yd., pest control, yd. maintenance incl. Photos & info www.1596eastbroad. blogspot.com, (706) 2550659.

4BR/2.5BA beautiful plantation house on 3 acres. High ceilings, HWflrs., lg. kitchen & rooms w/ a country setting. Front porch, screen porch & rear sunroom.

Pets welcome. 3–sided fence.

990 Double Bridges Rd. Avail. now! $1200/mo. + dep. (706) 319-1846, or (706) 548-4819.

GA. R, E, lic. 300830.

5 Pts. area. 3BR/2BA house.

CHAC, DW, laundry room w/ W/D, back deck, carport. Call (706) 255-0066.

599 W. Hancock Ave. Brand new construction 4BR/4BA. $1600/mo. W/D. Off–street parking, on busline, 2 blocks f ro m D w n t n . A w e s o m e location! Call to see (706) 247-3147.

640 Tallassee Rd.2BR/1BA home for rent, $600/mo. in a private setting. Just west of loop 10 on Tallassee Rd. Wood burning FP & “rocking chair” size front porch. CHAC, DW, & W/D conn. Your pet probably OK. Call Bill at Thornton Realty & Construction (706) 353-7700.

Avail. now! 3 & 4 BR cottages.

Individual leases. Close to campus! DW, W/D, micros, private BAs. $390–$485/BR. Call (706) 543-1910 or email becky@landmarkathens.com.

Av a i l a b l e n o w ! Newly renovated. Close to Dwntn, 3BR/1BA apt. in house, HWflrs, tile BA & kitchen. W/D, DW, CHAC. $750/mo. Call (706) 769-4779 or (706) 2072001.

Cute house on 1.6 acres. 3 rooms, kitchen & BA. 1/2 mi. from Athens Tech. 340 Calhoun Dr. $500/mo. or $69K. Call David (706) 247-1398.

Cute 2BR/1BA. New electric, BA, HVAC, refinished oak flrs., lg. yd. 2–car carport, outbuilding great as studio. $750/mo. + dep. Call Mark (706) 202-5110.

Eastside. Nice, clean 2BR/1BA house, quiet n’hood. New carpet, new windows, new installation. Avail. now! Culde-sac, many extras. $625/ mo. Call (706) 340-4619.

Eastside 2BR/1BA split lvl.

Lg. lv. area splits BRs. Lg. kitchen. Private drive. Big backyd. Storage bldg. Appls. incl. $650/mo. + dep. Pet negotiable. (706) 248-7338.

Early deadline for Classified Ad p l a c e m e n t ! We w i l l b e closed on Sept. 7th for the Labor Day Holiday. All Classified ad placements or changes must be submitted before 11am on Friday 9/4.

For Sale or Rent. 3BR/1BA in 5 Pts. 176 Habersham Dr. Avail. now! Pets OK. W/D & CHAC incl. $139,900 or $900/mo.

Call Talley Toro (706) 424-2695 or Calvin (912) 399-4057.

First mo. rent free! Close to Dwntn. New 4BR/3.5BA houses. 2 master BR’s & 2 private BA’s within house. New appls. Pets welcome. $1100/ mo. Call (706) 540-1257.

First month free. Walk to campus! 2 & 3BRs from $625/mo. W/D, DW, priv. deck, pets welcome. Mention this ad & pay no pet fee! ( 7 0 6 ) 5 4 8 - 2 5 2 2 , w w w. dovetailmanagement.com.

Lg. 3BR/2BA newly renovated historic home. New kitchen, BA, HVAC, W/D, DW. HWflrs, wrap–around porch. Less than 1/2 mi. from Dwntn. Pets welcome. $1000/mo. (706) 247-6469.

Nor thside 2BR/1BA, lg. lot, $600/mo. Hospital area Fenced–in yd. Avail.

June. $800/mo.Five Points 2BR/2.5BA, lv. rm. w/ FP, corner lot, $700/mo.

Eastside 3BR/2BA. Lg. yd., on dead–end street. $1100/ mo. 4BR/2BA w/ lg. yd. $1300/mo. 2 or 3BR/1BA w/ screened front porch, $800/ mo. Cedar Creek 4BR/2BA $1100/mo. Oconee County 3BR/2BA. Lv. rm. w/ FP, din. rm., double garage, $1100/ mo. Call McWaters Realty, (706) 549-3222, (706) 3532700, (706) 540-1529.

Newer in-town house for rent. $795/mo. 3BR/2BA w/ privacy fenced backyd., deck, all electric, sec. sys., 1 mi. from UGA Arch. Pets allowed.

Call Diane (706) 788-7997.

Own your own rental property!139 & 143 Strickland Ave. 4BR/3BA on each side of duplex. Each side for rent at $1200/mo. Entire duplex for sale $359,800. Call Reign at Coldwell Banker Upchurch Realty (706) 372-4166, or (706) 543-4000.

Remodeled 3BR/2BA. New electric, plumbing, HVAC, refinished HWflrs., tile BAs, IKEA kitchen, fenced yd. $850/mo. + dep. Call Mark (706) 202-5110.

Spacious 2BR/2.5BA Sleepy H o l l o w To w n h o u s e n e a r Memorial Park, wooded trails.

CHAC, DW, W/D, deck, pet friendly. Avail. immediately. $750/mo. (678) 777-6979.

UGA/5 Pts. area. All w/ W/D. 200 O l d Pri nceton R d., 3BR/2BA, $800. 255 Springdale, 2BR/1BA, $700. 387 Waddell, 2BR/1BA, $700. 398 Pinecrest Dr., 3BR/1BA, $900. (706) 3727300.

Houses for Sale 3BR/2BA country house. 9 mi. from Dwntn. FP. $138,000.

(706) 540-8461.

2BR/1.5BA Condo W/D, DW, CHAC, landscaped. Totally remodeled top to bottom! Must see! $51,000. Affordable living. 307 Chalfont Drive.

Call (770) 912-1577.

Downtown. Beautiful new construction. Key West–style home on hidden street next to Dwntn.

Lush tranquil setting! 140 Hendrix. Photos at www. fullcircleathens.com.

Michael Littleton (706) 2558600.

Full renovation! First St. millhouse. 1200 sq. ft. Big yd. 2BR/1BA. Tile & wood floors. 10 ft. ceilings. Metal roof. Custom kitchen– bathroom. $179K. Call Drew (706) 202-2712.

In–town historic style cottages w/ 3 acres greenspace. Green bldg. practices. Homes can be customized. $150K to low $200K. Michael Littleton (706) 255-8600 or visit www.fullcircleathens.com.

Lovely for sale by owner 3BR/2.5BA on large lot in quiet Lexington Estates on Eastside. Only 6+ mi. to campus. Open plan w/ FP, 2–car garage.

Country porch & rear d e c k . P r i v a t e re a r. Ta k e advantage of first time buyers tax credit. Parents w / s t u d e n t s m a y q u a l i f y.

Agents welcome. Please call Grace (404) 402-4921. ➤ continued on next page

Five mins. from campus, Dwntn, 3BR/1BA home. CHAC, WD, N/S, fenced backyd., oak flrs. $775/mo., (706) 338-1859.

Email bro@athens.net.

Normaltown/ARMC. 180 Willow Run. Very nice 3BR/1BA. HWflrs, DW, W/D, CHAC. Lg. fenced backyard. Pets OK w/ dep. (404) 210-7145.

3BR/3BA. Modern style houses. New construction!

Only 1 mi. from Dwntn.

Concrete & bamboo flring throughout. Energy efficient, unique materials. Over 1400 sq. ft. Awesome opportunity to live in a brand new custom house by local design/ build firm. (706) 425-9626 w/ any questions or to see houseplans.

4BR/4BA brick home.

Spacious BR w/ full BA. HVAC. Full kit., deck, lawn/ pest control. W/D incl. $860/ mo. (404) 274-0948.

4BR/2BA. New appls., W/D, new CHAC, clean, nice yd.

260 Timothy Rd. $900/mo. Call (706) 340-3435.

WELCH PLACE

G SPECREAT IALS!

The BEST Deal in Five Points Just Got Better!

HUGE 3BR Townhomes Newly Remodeled and 4BR/3BA Townhouse w/ Study Includes Washer & Dryer, Free Wireless and 42” Plasma TV! Call Today for viewing.

Hamilton & Associates 706-613-9001 · 706-613-1776(fax)

www.athens-ga-rental.com

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

33

R o m a n t i c 1 9 1 8 Vi c t o r i a n & historic 2–story guest cottage on 8 private acres. Excellent period restoration!

Must s e e p h o t o s a t w w w. fullcircleathens.com or Michael Littleton (706) 255-8600.

Winfield Chase on Prince Ave. 2BR/1.5BA. Right across from pool & laundry facility. Less than 2 mi. from UGA Campus.

Call Reign at Coldwell B a n k e r U p c h u rc h R e a l t y (706) 372-4166, or (706) 543-4000.

Land for Sale Houses & Lots. Dwntn., 2BR/1BA House on corner lot. 2 lots w/ city sewer adjacent to the house.

House currently cash flows $600/mo. Great starter home & investment opportunity. $162,900. For more info. call Jamie (706) 215-7078.

Roommates Room avail. for student roommate to share 3BR/1BA behind ARMC. W/D, CHAC, HWflrs., renovated house, fenced-in backyd. Pets w/ dep. $300/mo. + 1/3 utils.

(404) 713-0655.

1BR in 2BR/1BA Eastside duplex. Grad student or professional pref’d. W/D, DW, CHAC. $263/mo. + 1/2 utils. + dep. Avail. now! (706) 2541534. Lv. msg.

M/F Grad student/ professional. 2BR/1BA. $325/ mo. + 1/2 utils. Quiet n’hood.

5 Pts. Walk to campus/bus line. HWflrs, W/D, CHAC, DSL, med dog. Email thedobhran@hotmail.com.

Roommate needed. 2BR apt. w/ M student. $375/ mo., incl. utils. Walk/bike to UGA/5Pts/Dwntn. 2 blocks from busline. Swimming pool, patio. Avail. now! (706) 4105989.

Very nice room avail. now.

Great house, historic n’hood.

HWflrs, WiFi, CHAC, W/D, DW, screened–in porch. No pets pls. $325/mo. + 1/3 utils.

(706) 254-2991.

Rooms for Rent Spacious, furnished BR. Quiet, close to campus, kitchen, laundry privileges.

Shared BA, priv. entrance.

No pets. M students only. $275/mo. incl. utils.

(706) 353-0227. Avail. immediately!

Room for rent in Bridgewater Sub. $460/mo. per person.

All utils & cable/Inter net/ alarm system incl. F needed ASAP! Lg. rm. w/ walk–in closet. (678) 787-6327.

For Sale Businesses Borders! Print section of the Classifieds. Pictures! Check them out on the Flagpole website. New Categories!

To satisfy Athens Classified Ad needs! A l l c o m i n g soon. And still the lowest rates in town! Place your ad at www.flagpole.com.

Cheap restaurant/bar/pool room for sale. 243–A N. Broad St., Winder, GA 30680.

(678) 963-0794 or (678) 5228891. Ask for Doug, if he is not avail., pls. lv. a msg! Full bar, full kitchen, 7 top of the line pool tables. Business is up & running. This ad will do the business no justice, you really need to come out & see the place. It’s great!

We are selling & selling cheap due to death & now sickness in the family. We are asking $55K cash up front for everything! To see more about our daily activities (to get an idea of the business), go to www.myspace.com/ wewanttomeetyou. Thank you!

Computers Brand new laptops & desktops. Bad credit, no credit, no problem. Small wkly payments. Order today & get free Nintendo Wii game system! Call now (800) 8405439 (AAN CAN).

Furniture Ta b l e s , c h a i r s , s o f a s , antiques, clothes, records & players, retro goods, & more!

Cool, affordable furniture every day. Go to Agora!

Your favorite everything store!

260 W. Clayton St., (706) 3160130.

Eat your veggies, don’t spend all your money, shop Mom’s Garage. Gently used furniture for frugal people.

Sat. from 12–5pm & appts.

Chase Park Warehouse on Tracy St. (706) 207-7855.

Gently used fur niture at AthensGaFurniture.com.

Sofas $100+, dining tables $50, bed sets $50, desks $20, loveseats $75+, chairs, accent tables, & much more.

(706) 340-3969.

Pillowtop Queen Mattress set.

Never used. Still in factory plastic. $260. Full size mattress set. Never used. Still in factory plastic. $160. (706) 769-1959. Delivery avail.

Miscellaneous Come to Betty for vintage quilted Chanel bags, just in for Fall! On the corner of Pulaski & Clayton, next to Agora. Open 1–4 daily. (706) 424-0566.

Baby piano $8500. Pop-Up camper $3200. Canoe $350.

NordicFlex $225. Gazelle $300. TotalGym $300. Ping Pong table $25. Van $2500.

Convertible $5900. Call (706) 850-1909.

Muscadine, Scuppernong grapes ready at the Vineyard.

8 mi. east of Lexington on Highway 78. Open 7 days.

Also local produce, boiled peanuts, blueberries & more.

Music Equipment Roland TD–10 V Drums. $1400, price negotiable.

Comes w/ extras: sound proofing tiles, drumming DVDs, teaching workbooks.

Contact (706) 202-7316 or e m a i l re d h u b c a p @ g m a i l . com.

Instruction Athens School of Music.

Instruction in Guitar, Bass, Drums, Piano, Voice, Brass, Woodwinds, Strings, Banjo, Mandolin, Fiddle, & more.

From beginner to exper t.

Instrument repairs avail.

(706) 543-5800.

G u i t a r l e s s o n s taught

by UGA Doctoral guitar instructor. All styles. 18 yrs. exp. Students have won several guitar competitions.

1st lesson free. Composition/ theory & bass lessons too. David Mitchell, ( 7 0 6 ) 5 4 6 - 7 0 8 2 o r w w w. mitchellmusicguitar.com.

Piano Lessons: All levels welcome. Taught on large artist concert grand piano in upscale Athens n’hood near UGA. Excellent teacher w/ Bachelor’s Degree in Piano Performance with Honors.

Discounts for UGA students & families. Call (706) 5490707 or email shane_ aldredge@bellsouth.net.

Wedding Bands. Quality, professional bands. Weddings, parties. Rock, Jazz, etc. Call Classic City Entertainment. ( 7 0 6 ) 5 4 9 - 1 5 6 7 . w w w. classiccityentertainment.com.

Featuring The Magictones— Athens’ premiere wedding & p a r t y b a n d . w w w. themagictones.com.

Musicians Wanted Folk guitar, singer–songwriter seeking bass or stand–up bass & percussion. (678) 9885310.

Services Health Pregnant? Considering adoption? Talk w/ caring agency specializing in matching birthmothers w/ families nationwide.

Living expenses paid. Call 24/7. Abby’s One True Gift Adoptions (866) 413-6293 (AAN CAN).

Home and Garden Backyard Solutions.

Make your neighbors jealous!

Waterfalls, ponds, fences, decks, gazebos, porches, & more! Call Robin for free estimate! (706) 340-4492.

Hardman General Contractors. Major renovations & Major additions. Completely Insured. Many references, Quality work for Commercial & Residential. For more info call Comus Hardman (404) 790-6996.

Sports

Music Services

Martial Arts. Ladies Kickboxing, Kenpo Karate, Kali, Silat, Muay Thai, Tue. & Thu., 6pm–8pm. 4th Degree Black Belt. Call Steve (706) 410-0951, or email steve@ karatefire.com.

Guitar Repair, setups, electronics & fretwork by 20 yr. pro. Thousands of previous clients. Proceeds help benefit Nu i’s Space.

Contact Jeff, (404) 643-9772 or www.AthensGuitar.com for details.

Tutoring for kids still learning English in after–school settings. All volunteers w e l c o m e . S e e C L A S E ’s website, www.coe.uga.edu/ clase/tutoring, for more info.

Fret Shop. Professional guitar repairs & modifications, setups, electronics, precision fretwork. Previous clients incl. R.E.M., Widespread Panic, Cracker, Bob Mould, John Berr y, Abbey Road Live!, Squat. (706) 549-1567.

Looking for a fun, classy alter native to the typical wedding band? If you are looking for “YMCA” than Squat is not your band.

If you want Duke Ellington, Ray Charles, & salsa, then visit w w w. s q u a t m e . com/weddings. (706) 548-0457.

Tutors

Jobs Full-time Early deadline for Classified Ad p l a c e m e n t ! We w i l l b e closed on Sept. 7th for the Labor Day Holiday. All Classified ad placements or changes must be submitted before 11am on Friday 9/4.

Aw a rd – w i n n i n g R e p u b l i c Salon seeks stylist(s) to join our creative talent. Offering competitive commissions, full benefits incl. paid vacation.

Drop off resume at 312 E. Broad St., 3rd flr.

Hardcore Sales Reps Needed. Hourly + commission. PT & FT positions avail. I need the best & forget the rest! Call Chris (770) 560-5653.

34

FLAGPOLE.COM ∙ SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

Dental Office Person needed for busy Athens practice. Ability to Multitask a must. Mon–Fri. Following on–the–job training, the right person will primarily perform dental assisting but also be asked to perform front office duties.

Bachelors degree a n d m i n 3 . 5 G PA p re f e r re d . M us t prov i de work references showing long-term employment per job. Computer literate. Great opportunity for a great employee. $15/ hr. during training phase.

Employer contributes 100% to retirement plan. Apply at DentalAthens@gmail.com.

Bulldawg Pizza & Wings.

Deliver y drivers & phone person needed. Earn good money PT & FT. Must work home games. (706) 3553294.

Head chef/kitchen manager at Donderos’ Kitchen. Must be organized & efficient.

Mor ning & after noon hrs, some weekends. Call (706) 389-7955.

M a r k e t i n g C o m m u n i c a t i o n Specialist. Join an est.

Athens company calling C E O ’s & C F O ’s o f m a j o r corporations generating sales leads for technology c o m p a n i e s . $ 9 / h r. B O S S t a f f i n g w w w. b o s t e m p s . com, (706) 353-3030.

Sexy Suz Adult Emporium now hiring 21+ retail positions. Retail experience pref’d. Email resume/photo to sexysuz@comcast.net.

No calls pls. 50 Gaines School Rd. TSAV is looking for an IT specialist w/ exper tise in Linux-based VOIP, Windows network administration, Exchange, Small Business S e r v e r, M S S h a r e P o i n t .

Salaried position w/ health insurance, paid vacation, 401(k) matching. Call (706) 613-8759 for details or email resume to cristinepilgrim@ tsav.com.

Opportunities Now hiring! Companies desperately need employees to assemble products at home. No selling, any hours. $500/wk. potential.

Info at (985) 646-1700 dept.

GA–3058.

Brand new laptops & desktops. Bad credit, no credit, no problem. Small wkly payments. Order today & get free Nintendo Wii game system! Call now (800) 816-2232 (AAN CAN).

Ear n $75-$200/hr. Media M a k e u p A r t i s t Tr a i n i n g make–up artist for ads, TV, film, fashion. 1 wk. class.

Stable job in weak economy.

D e t a i l s a t h t t p : / / w w w.

MediaMakeupAr tists.com, (310) 364-0665 (AAN CAN).

Bodyguards wanted. Free training for members. No experience OK. Excellent $. FT & PT. Expenses paid when you travel. (615) 2281701, www.psubodyguards. com (AAN CAN).

Earn $40! UGA researchers looking for F age 18 & older who purge at least twice/ mo. to participate in a 1–visit re s e a rc h s t u d y. C o n t a c t bnstudy@uga.edu.

High School diploma! Fast, affordable & accredited.

Free brochure. Call now!

(800) 532-6546 ext.

9 7 . G o t o h t t p : / / w w w. c o n t i n e n t a l a c a d e m y. c o m (AAN CAN).

Part-time Mystery shoppers earn up to $100/day. Undercover shoppers needed to judge retail & dining establishments. No exp. req’d. (800) 743-8535.

Vehicles Autos 1985 MB 300D, 268, XXX miles. Bombproof.

Daily driver. PW/Pl/sunroof.

Run anything combustible.

New Greasecar kit, w/ 13-gallon tank. Free WVO e v e r y w h e re ! $ 2 7 5 0 n e g .

(706) 621-0135.

2005 Honda Civic LX for sale. Excellent condition.

71K mi. Auto, anti-theft system, AM/FM radio, CD player, PS, PL, cruise control etc. Price $8750. Call Judith (706) 207-8755.

Van for Band. 1997 Astro Cargo, 80,845 mi., safety cage, cruise, tilt wheel, cold air, automatic, new paint, uses gas or propane. $3200.

John (706) 614-0306.

Bicycles Bike cargo trailer. Burley.

Lightweight but hauls 100 lbs!

Quick release universal hitch.

Snap-on cover. 20” wheels.

Folds for storage or transport. $125. (706) 369-3523.

Motorcycles 2007 Harley Davidson Fatboy Softtail. Perfect condition. Adult owned.

Crisis-low price $4300!

Email ddt174@gmail.com or call (770) 818-5489.

Notices Messages G a i n n a t i o n a l e x p o s u re .

Reach over 5 million young, active, educated readers for only $995 by advertising in 110 weekly newspapers like this one. Call Jason (202) 2898484 (AAN CAN).

Organizations Advertise your business in 111 alternative newspapers like this one. Over 6 million circulation ever y wk. for $1200. No adult ads. Call Rick at (202) 289-8484 (AAN CAN).

Personals Friendly, attractive 43 yr. old white male seeks male 25-45 yrs. old for tennis, friendship, & road trips. If interested pls. call (478) 451-7381.

everyday people Rufino Cornejo, House Framer Consider the Athens, GA familiar to the rest of the country: the town known for its historic college campus and hip downtown, the place that frat boys and hipsters alike flock to. Now consider the lesser-known Athens: the town that is like any other small patch of American suburbia, populated with Wal-marts and strip malls along spacious roads with few traffic lights and no bike lanes. Rufino Cornejo, a 36-year-old man from Mexico, is one of those folks who lives in the latter, a man unfamiliar to and unconcerned with what happens in the former. Hailing from a small town in Michoacán, Rufino came to America fresh out of high school with a new bride at his side. Like many a Latino immigrant, his job history in the United States encompasses the spectrum of manual labor, from laying concrete to picking oranges. Nowadays he’s rough-framing new houses in surrounding counties, which he thoroughly enjoys. On a muggy summer evening I joined him in his home on the north side of town, and we spoke over the faint din of his wife cooking and his two young and polite children playing in a nearby room.

Flagpole: How many days a week do you work?

Rufino Cornejo: Now, I do at least two or three days a week… [it was] normally six days.

FP: Was it the economic situation that caused you to lose so many hours?

RC: Yeah, it start from the beginning of this year only.

living; he was living in a little town called Okeechobee—I knew that wasn’t my job. It was too heavy.

$5 PITCHERS EVERY NIGHT!

$2 DOMESTIC BEER ALL DAY, EVERY DAY!

LIVE MUSIC EVERY WEEKEND!

FP: Construction isn’t heavy work?

RC: Nothing compared with picking up oranges… or crop[ping] tobacco.

FP: Is Athens your favorite place you’ve lived in America so far?

RC: Yeah. I used to live in Atlanta, but like I said, I don’t like big cities at all. That’s what I belonged to, a little bitty town in Mexico… you get used to it.

FP: Do you ever go downtown?

RC: Not at all.

FP: What do you like to do with your spare time?

RC: Reading… Right now I have plenty to do with my kids.

I take them to the karate classes, so I have no chance—actually I have no spare time… but I like to walk a lot in the park.

Sometimes jogging and running.

FP: What kind of stuff do you like to read?

RC: Novels, or religion. Anything about history or anything that you can learn any skills.

FP: [taking a cue from Rufino’s T-shirt] Are you Catholic?

RC: Yes.

MON. TUES.

WED., SEPT. 2

thurs.

Charles-Ryan Barber

FP: Would you say most of the people you associate with are Catholic?

RC: Pretty much… [but] you know, we always like to argue about it. We’re not really convinced about it… I’ve been seeing a lot of mistakes… [but] I never have wanted to change because if I change my religion I will still be the same.

FP: Do you have an opinion about President Obama?

RC: A real bad opinion. Remember [Vicente] Fox Quesada in Mexico? He would be the same… how do you call the thing that moves like this [makes hand gesture of puppeteer]?

FP: Do you like your job?

RC: To me, that’s the only job that I have found that I really like it. It applies your body and your mind.

FP: Could you explain the mental part of the job a little more?

RC: You know, the homeowners came by to you and give you the blueprint. And the hardest part is when they start to make any changes on it. Even when they took a year or more than that to figure it out, the kind of house they want—they still make more changes.

FP: What made you want to come to America?

RC: The rough situation in Mexico… mainly the economy.

FP: How did you find work once you got here?

RC: The first job… was [through] relatives. They was working on the concrete. Laying foundation, doing the slabs for the houses in Forsyth County.

FP: Did you do this kind of work in Mexico?

RC: Never in my life. I didn’t even know how to handle a hammer.

FP: Is there anything you miss about Mexico?

RC: Only the school time, when I was a student. A lot of friends. Everything besides that—no, I’m fine.

FP: Was construction the only thing available to you up here?

RC: I work in the farms, too… Before I pick up some oranges—I was going back to Florida where my brother was

FP: You think that Obama is a puppet?

RC: Yes… I always like new things and challenges, but he talk a lot. And the person that talks a lot, he is not true.

FP: What kind of food do you like to eat?

RC: One white guy ask me one time if I like to visit Mexican restaurants. I said, “No… because I eat Mexican food the whole week!” My wife don’t work, so she cooks tortillas made by hand… you know, you probably ate some Mexican tortillas that came from a pack. The ones that are made by hand, it doesn’t have a word to qualify it.

FP: So, I imagine your wife is a good cook.

RC: She’s a good cook… I knew that before I started chasing her [laughs]… I got married in Mexico.

FP: Oh, really? I thought you might have met her here in America.

RC: No… the Mexican girls, when they come single to here, they have a different thinking. They start to think like white girls, which is not good.

FP: What do you think these girls want?

RC: That’s the main question, because you never know their answer. They just want everything… The way that I’m thinking, if I want to get together or marry with a woman, that’s the one I want to have only. Most of the girls here are not thinking that way.

FP: “They want everything.” You think that’s the reason why we have so much divorce here in America?

RC: I don’t think so. I’m sure about it.

Jeff Gore

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009 · FLAGPOLE.COM

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